MCO Relief Effort

When the Malaysian Government first announced the Movement Control Order (MCO) that lasted from 18 March 2020 until 12 May 2020, PPKJB in collaboration with Church of Praise Johor Bahru (COPJB), set up a task force to look into providing relief efforts for those affected by the MCO.

Working with 2 food establishments, the task force decided to provide daily meals to needy families in the Bukit Indah area. As funds were limited and not knowing how long the MCO would last, the efforts were focused on 2 block of low-cost flats in Bukit Indah to ensure that we had sufficient funds to sustain providing meals for the duration of the MCO. As donations poured in, we were able to provide more meals to other areas.

PPKJB were also referred families that were struggling due to the MCO. On top of meals, the task force also activated volunteers to help deliver groceries to needy families. In some cases, we provided cash payout to individuals who had total loss of incomes because their services were no longer needed during the MCO. These included for example cleaners, security guards, drivers and odd-job labourers. Most did not have much savings and were struggling with basic necessities. 

In total, the project for the first MCO helped more than 300 families, provided more than 7000 meals and utilised RM80,000 in aid.

With the rise in the number of Covid-19 cases, MCO was reintroduced again on 13 January 2021. This time, with limited funds, we concentrated our efforts to mostly providing only groceries to the residents of the low-cost flats in Bukit Indah again. We also decided to provide groceries to some families within the Bukit Indah-Skudai vicinity, that were referred by another NGO.

Within the period of end January 2021 to early March 2021, around RM17,000 in aid has been disbursed benefiting around 70 families.

While the MCO was recently lifted again, we still foresee some of these families requiring assistance as the economy slowly recovers. Given more funds, the task force hopes to extend the aid for a longer period and also to prepare for another round of relief efforts in case another MCO is re-introduced.