DAP will work with all political parties to press Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin to extend the bank loan moratorium by another six months, said Lim Guan Eng today.

He said this extension was needed to save jobs and businesses affected by the recent surge in Covid-19 infections. 

“The Perikatan Nasional government has disappointed many Malaysians by failing to extend the bank loan moratorium automatically by another six months when Muhyiddin presented an additional RM10 billion supplementary Kita Prihatin financial aid last month,” he said in a statement.

The former finance minister said the Kita Prihatin package was unlikely to help boost the economy following the record number of recent Covid-19 cases.

He said the third wave of infections has dampened any economic recovery, especially amongst small businesses.

“(It) requires immediate economic and financial measures, to stave off another economic decline in the final quarter of the year.

“For this reason, the automatic extension of the bank loan moratorium by another six months till March 31, 2021, is necessary to counter the decline in economic growth,” he said.

Lim said the loan moratorium that expired on September 30, 2020, had helped ease the burden on businesses and households affected by the post Covid-19.

The three-month moratorium was introduced by the PN government to ease the economic impact of the movement control order imposed to curb Covid-19 transmissions.

Banks were ordered to defer ,mortgage loans and hire-purchase agreement  payments in that period.

Lim said the value of the loan moratorium which helped eight million individual and corporate borrowers was RM90 billion, a huge financial relief that has helped save livelihood, businesses and jobs.

Following the end of the moratorium in September, Muhyiddin had said that the government had pushed for the banks to give targeted bank loan moratorium extension and bank assistance. 

The prime minister had said that this has assisted over 1.4 million borrowers.

“However, this number of borrowers is still very much lower than the eight million individual and corporate borrowers benefiting from the automatic six-month extension of bank loan moratorium.

“The cost of the automatic loan moratorium extension is only RM6.4 billion. The banking industry which recorded profits of RM32 billion in 2019 can afford such cost,” said Lim.

He added that all political parties should collaborate to press for the automatic extension of the loan moratorium by another six months to save Malaysian jobs and businesses. – October 28, 2020.