Indonesia declares emergency over coronavirus

CORONAVIRUS | Indonesian President Joko Widodo declared a public health emergency over the coronavirus epidemic today and said an additional US$24.9 billion would be spent to cushion its impact.

Widodo said he signed a new regulation that “gives financial authorities the power to take extraordinary steps to ensure public health, save the national economy and the financial system”.

The regulation would waive a cap on a maximum budget deficit for three years, he said.

“The government decided that the total additional spending to manage Covid-19 is as much as 405.1 trillion rupiah,” he said, adding that this will widen the 2020 budget deficit to as much as 5.07 percent of gross domestic product, the widest in more than a decade.

The stimulus package includes a three percentage point reduction in the corporate tax rate to 22 percent, he said.

Other measures include expanding social welfare to benefit up to 10 million households, food assistance and electricity tariff discounts and waivers, he told reporters.

Medical experts have said the world’s fourth-most-populous country must impose tighter restrictions on movements as known cases of the highly infectious respiratory illness have gone from none in early March to 1,528, with 136 deaths.

Indonesia suspended all foreign arrivals today after a study showed more than 140,000 people in the Southeast Asian country could die of the virus.

Fear about the disease and its impact on livelihoods is spreading.

“The impact of the virus can be felt a lot already,” said Ajun, 46, a motorbike driver for ride-hailing app Gojek.

He said he used to get up to 20 jobs a day before the outbreak but now got five at most.

“I’m scared... but I have a family that I have to provide for... where would I get money from?” said the father-of-two. - Reuters

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