THOUSANDS of Malaysians have sought help for food and other essentials through a website that was only launched a week ago, said one of its founders.

Reza Razali, who with his friends launched the Kita Jaga Malaysia website on July 5, said within a week more than 7,000 people have asked for support and the number is growing.

He also told The Malaysian Insight that even more people – more than 15,000 at the last count – are willing to contribute to the needy, either in the form of food, groceries and other essential items.

“The 7,000 people who are requesting help are of various races and some of them are non-Malaysians,” he said.

“Even our team consists of Malaysians and non-Malaysians. In fact, the idea to set up this website came from an Indonesian who only wants to be known as Achan.”

Reza said more than one million Malaysians have accessed the website since its launch.

He said the request for help has been greater in the cities, especially in Selangor and Kuala Lumpur.

Reza, who is also the founder of Terato Tech, a company based in Bangi, Selangor, said the idea of the Kita Jaga website came from Achan, Edo, Hisyam and Basyrun.

It was then developed by Terato Tech.

Reza said they faced glitches as they were developing the website as a weekend hackathon and had to occasionally take it down to fix it and get it back up.

The website matches those who need help with those who are ready to assist.

Those needing help is required to drop a pin on their location, leave their contact details and state what they need.

They can also search for people who have volunteered to provide aid and look for available food banks.

Those willing to help can either list down the items they can provide and where to collect them from, or help affected people directly.

Bendera Putih app

In recent weeks, affected Malaysians have resorted to flying white flags to signal their need for food and a bit of cash to survive.

Before the entry of the Kita Jaga website, three young Malaysians had created the Bendera Putih app (now called Sambalsos.com) to crowdsource reports of white flags and food bank locations around the country.

The app was the idea of student volunteers Sidharrth Nagappan, Cornelius Pang and Shaun Mak, who launched the app on June 4.

The app is to connect people ready to help with those in need of help during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Many businesses, volunteer groups, residents’ associations and individuals have also set up food banks to provide assistance for the needy and desperate.

All MPs have been allocated RM300,000 each to carry out the food basket aid programme, where essential goods will be distributed to their affected constituents under the Pemulih stimulus package announced on June 28.

The government said each food basket should contain 13 types of items, namely 10kg of rice, two units of 1kg cooking oil, two units of 1kg of sugar, two units of wheat flour (850g to 1kg per unit), two tins of condensed milk at 500g to 550g each, one unit of salt at 400g to 450g, two units of meehoon at 350g to 400g, one bottle of sweet soy sauce at 600ml to 700ml, one bottle of chilli sauce at 300g to 400g, two tins of sardines at 400g to 425g, one unit of tea at 100g to 150g, one unit of coffee at 100g to 150g and one unit of biscuits at 350g to 450g.

However, opposition MPs have said the government’s 13-item list does not address nutrition needs and that the RM300,000 flat rate for all constituencies is unfair.

They said the one-size-fits-all allocation of RM300,000 per constituency will not be enough to help many Malaysians overcome the financial hardship during the pandemic.

They added that the problem is exacerbated because they have hundreds of thousands of people in their constituencies. – July 12, 2021.