WHICHEVER party forms the government in Malacca must have a clear direction on how budget hotels – heavily reliant on tourism – are going to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic, industry players said.

“They have to continue giving us assistance, it will take time for us to recover, so during this time we will need support,” Malacca Malaysia Budget and Business Hotel Association (MyBHA) chairman Sazali Sabri said.

He proposed that it would be a good idea if these budget hotel operators were allowed some form of tax relief.

“We hope to get easy payment for the assessment tax. This will help us with our cash flow.”

He also added that they wanted the incoming state exco in charge of tourism to continue with promotions and other incentives.

“It was a bad year for us. The movement control order (MCO) and the closing of local and international borders affected our businesses.

“Revenue was down by as much as 95% and at least 30 of our members have closed down,” he told The Malaysian Insight.

He said that during the MCO hotels were only about 2-3% occupied.

Sazali said that since January this year the industry in the state could have suffered losses of more than RM60 million.

“We need to get together (with the new government). We have to look back at the past two years and improve our industry.

“The new state government must think of the rakyat first, because many have lost their jobs and businesses.

“We suffered, some hotels did not generate any revenue.”

Malacca will be going to the polls this Saturday after four assemblymen withdrew support for Chief Minister Sulaiman Md Ali, which led to the dissolution of the state assembly.

Labour shortage an issue

Sazali said that the association has 176 members who run more than 200 budget hotels across the state.

“Currently, 25 hotels are not open because they are still in the recovery process and they want to wait for Chinese New Year.

“The issue they face now is shortage of manpower, labour problems. During the MCO, some operators had to lay off their staff or ask them to go on unpaid leave.

“The staff could survive for one or two months but after a year they have moved on.”

He said that this shortage of staff that are now employed elsewhere has affected the industry.

“So, it is difficult. We have a labour shortage because we can’t hire foreigners.

“Maybe it’s about time the government gave some leeway and solution to solve this problem.”

However, Sazali noted that there were signs of improvement, especially after the government allowed interstate travel.

“There are tourists coming in and business activities have started again. Hotels, restaurants and tourist attractions have started to open again.

“Now that we are recovering, we hope that international borders will be opened very soon.”

He added that Singapore was one of the main income sources for the Malacca budget hotel market.

“On weekends, the Singaporean crowd would account for up to 30% occupancy in budget hotels.

“Malacca caters mostly for domestic tourists, but about 30% to 40% are foreign tourists, the bulk of which are from Singapore and China.”

He said since the opening of interstate travel, some hotels were reporting occupancy rates of 30-40% on weekdays, with as much as 60% on weekends.

“We hope that the government will look into opening international borders. We are already in the endemic stage, so the most important thing is to follow SOPs.” – November 18, 2021.