Karachi’s business community opposes lockdown strategy

The business and industrial community of Karachi Friday strongly opposed the lockdown strategy to deal with the pandemic and recommended mandatory vaccination and strict observance of SOPs as the only workable solution for minimizing the number of Covid-19 cases.

Instead of imposing lockdown Sindh government should carry out aggressive vaccination campaign, said Chairman Businessmen Group (BMG) and Former President Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) Zubair Motiwala, who attended the provincial coronavirus taskforce meeting at CM House.

In a statement issued here by KCCI, Zubair Motiwala, while sharing the details of the meeting mentioned that meeting was informed that 428 people lost their lives in the month of July, of which only 46 were of old age and also suffering from chronic diseases. It shows that vaccine was the only weapon to defeat the pandemic, he asserted.

He further informed that Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah agreed that the delivery service of restaurants would continue while the export-oriented industries and all their allied industries would also continue to operate.

Chairman BMG stressed that the small traders and shopkeepers have been facing a lot of problems due to lockdowns and limited business hours therefore government should try its best to minimize the grievances being faced by these shopkeepers as well as the public.

“These are challenging times and every member of the society is facing problems due to COVID crises. Perhaps, it is time when the government should think about extending monetary help to citizens especially the small shopkeepers who are now in net debt position and even paying rents to owners of their business premises has really become difficult,” he appealed.

Senior Vice President KCCI M. Saqib who also attended the meeting suggested that the number of COVID-19 Vaccination Centers have to be enhanced all over the city and made operational at Union Council (UC) level so that the people could get vaccinated in a hassle -free environment as it has been observed that many people were reluctant to visit the existing overcrowded vaccination centers.