KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 8 — National Recovery Council (NRC) chairman Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said the views of stakeholders were taken into account before further recommendations were made to the government.

"We organised a series of engagement sessions not just in the Klang Valley but across the country. I went to Langkawi, Melaka, Johor, Kelantan, Terengganu and met with youth groups, academicians, NGOs, business associations and chambers of commerce to have a frank dialogue on the issues and challenges confronting these different groups,” he said in a recent interview.

It was during these sessions that he realised the impact of the implementation of the National Recovery Plan as well as the vaccination programme on everybody.

Many of the people he met recounted how their businesses and livelihoods were saved.

"That touched me,” he added.

Even foreign-owned businesses were thankful as they compared Malaysia’s policies with that of other countries, Muhyiddin said.

More than RM15 billion was spent on wage subsidies to help more than 300,000 businesses (mostly small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to save more than three million jobs.

"We gave more than RM50 million for food baskets when we did targeted lockdowns. We gave individual MPs RM500,000 each for food baskets.”

More than RM22 billion in direct cash assistance was given out during the pandemic to more than 10.1 million recipients.

"We spent more than RM5 billion procuring vaccines... because we knew we were racing against time. The extra purchase meant we could do booster shots faster than any other country.

"The three consecutive quarters of economic growth we enjoy today are all due to the bold policies we took to safeguard the economy and systematically re-opening it through the NRP.”

Muhyiddin added that more still needs to be done as many businesses complained about the difficulties of getting foreign workers to work in sectors like F&B, plantation as well as the lack of a co-ordinated push for tourism sector recovery.

On top of that are the financing difficulties of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) businesses.

Close to 98 per cent of registered business entities in Malaysia are MSMEs and they contribute close to 40 per cent of Malaysia’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) so this is a pressing problem if Malaysia’s economy is to recover steadily.

That is why, Muhyiddin stressed, that RM6.08 billion was disbursed directly to MSMEs under the Geran Khas Prihatin program.

He said the country needs to strive for an even recovery process as certain states are "dependent more on certain sectors. "Take tourism and manufacturing... tourism recovery is slower... states dependent on tourism will recover slower that states that are big on manufacturing.

"The uneven pace of recovery between states will widen income and development gaps between states. That is why I had emphasised the setting up of state-level NRCs.”

He said he feared the impact of the pandemic will linger longer if the recovery process is not managed well. "When the recovery is not given due priority, I am afraid that the two pandemic years will lead to a lost decade for Malaysia.”