Children being looked after at a nursery in Komtar. — Filepic
REGISTERED childcare centres and nurseries caring for the children of frontliners and working parents are allowed to operate during the conditional movement control order (MCO) period.
However, the childcare centres and nurseries need to adhere fully to the standard operating procedure.
Penang welfare committee chairman Phee Boon Poh said the requirements included ensuring that the centres were registered with the state Welfare Department.
“The centres need to obtain permission from the state Welfare Department director and submit verification letters from the employers of the parents or guardians confirming that the affected parent or guardian needs to work.
“They also need to adhere to the SOP for taska safety and the social care sector as directed by the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry,” he said in a statement on Thursday.
Phee added that unregistered childcare centres and nurseries looking to obtain permission to operate would not be considered.
“This is in line with the operating permission for childcare centres and nurseries during the conditional MCO period under the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases Act 1988 (Act 342).
“Childcare centres under technical agencies including state authorities, the Fire and Rescue Department as well as the Health Department need to fulfill requirements under these agencies for licences to be issued.
“Then the centres can put forward their applications to the Welfare Department for registration.
“Under the district Welfare Department office, all completed and submitted applications will be processed within 48 hours.”
For more details or a list of the registered childcare centres, the public may visit www.jkm.gov.my
May 24, 2016 ... Chris Hong, who runs two kindergartens-cum-daycare centres in Subang Jaya,
said she and her staff looked after 40 to 50 children from 8am to ...
Michelle Wie practicing at the Ko Oina Golf Club. This is before she began to have her problems off the tee. Notice the smooth but powerful transition and follow through. She started to jump at the ball for awhile, but now is back to a real good move. Notice BJ Wie, her ever-present father...
https://youtu.be/GMPCrQE7KSw
Golf has been fortunate enough to continue in the Covid climate.
The one-buggy one-player recommendation not enforced everywhere
AS the Covid-19 pandemic continues to afflict golf clubs across the length and breadth of the nation, one or two have resorted to giving the buggies recommendation a miss.
Almost all the local clubs have embraced the one-buggy oneplayer policy set in the guidelines of the Malaysian Golf Association (MGA). However, a quick check by TeeUp has revealed that there was one or two who chose not to follow suit and have opted to continue as before (the pandemic).
It is understood that the MGA “guidelines” are recommendations and the clubs are not bound by law to carry them out, unless they are those incorporated from the standard operating procedures (SOPs) of the health authorities.
Not surprisingly, the said clubs contacted for comment on the matter declined to offer any response.
It must be mentioned also that at one of the clubs (where twoper-buggy is still practiced), the players must be husband and wife, or from the same family and/ or the same Covid bubble.
All the other leading clubs in the Klang Valley that TeeUp spoke to about the buggy policy said they had initiated the MGA’s guidelines in full.
Speaking to TeeUp in an earlier interview, MGA president Admiral Tan Sri Mohd Anwar Mohd Nor (R) said they would issue updates as when these became applicable and added that they too were being guided by the Health Ministry.
“These SOPs and guidelines have been put in place to help curb the spread of the coronavirus and we will continue to work with the health authorities in their efforts to flatten the curve,” he said.
“It is our sincere hope that the golf clubs and other industry stakeholders will join forces and adhere to the SOPs without exception. This is most important in the fight to curb the spread of this virus.”
Mohd Anwar added that the national association’s annual general meeting, which was scheduled for last month, will be held at a date to be determined when “all is safe to do so.
“We had no option but to postpone the annual general meeting because of Covid-19. The safety and well-being of our members and all others in the related fields of golf, is our priority and we will not detour from this approach,” added Mohd Anwar.
“Once things improve and we get the nod from the health authorities, we will host the annual meeting – but not before then.”
At this year’s annual general meeting (if indeed it does go ahead) there will be no elections for the top positions within the organisation, given that they are in the middle of their terms.
The Professional Golf Association of Malaysia (PGAM) were also expected to have staged their annual meeting by now, but failed to do so because of the pandemic. And they are, likewise, waiting to set a new date when the circumstances allow them to.
Golf is one of the few sports that has been fortunate enough to continue in the present Covid climate, but with strict standard operating procedures set down by the Health Ministry. Among these are:
Pre-Game SOPs
> Golfers with any colds or coughs or any symptoms of Covid 19 shall be prohibited from entering the golf club.
> Bookings shall be made in advance.
> Enforce one golfer per buggy.
> Golf competitions suspended until further notice.
> Use MySejahtera to record golfers and employees entry to the golf club.
> Accept only online payment or bank transfer. Registration counter shall not accept any cash payment.
> Golfers shall register 20 minutes before tee time. Registration staff to be equipped with face masks/gloves. Hand sanitiser readily available at registration counter and disposable pencils made available.
> Temperature check for each golfer before entering the golf club and to sanitise their hands by security guard.
> One golfer to register for each flight.
> Social distancing markers to be clearly outlined at the registration counter.
> Interaction shall be limited between golfers and staff.
> Each golfer to complete and submit a Health/ Travel Declaration form prior registration.
RCEP will promote and facilitate international trade among the 15 participating countries in the Asia-Pacific region and the expected increase in free trade will have a significant impact on the Malaysian property market. -NST/file pic.
The signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) signifies the world's largest trade agreement and will contribute towards sustaining Malaysia as a preferred trading hub and investment destination.
RCEP will promote and facilitate international trade among the 15 participating countries in the Asia-Pacific region and the expected increase in free trade will have a significant impact on the Malaysian property market.
Higher trade and economic activities will impact on the occupation, investment and development sectors of the property market. Real estate space is a local input in the production and supply of goods and services. Increased exports lead to the expansion of domestic production.
Increased domestic production increases the demand for industrial space. Imports also have an impact on demand for real estate space. Goods imported need to be stored and distributed through warehouses and logistic properties.
These goods are then displayed and marketed at various outlets points thereby increasing the demand for retail spaces in retail malls.
Regional trading bloc and trade liberalisation will encourage foreign direct investments (FDI). These FDIs will create demand for industrial land and buildings. New capital investments will spur demand for more financing activities from the banks.
Once the plants and machines are in operations, it will create employment and demand on other factors of production. Higher economic growth will drive the capital market which will attract more foreign investment fund flows investing into local equities.
With increased economic activities, occupation demand for real estate space will cause rental increase. With inelastic new supply, potential future rental growth and prospective capital appreciation, investors will start to invest in real estate leading to an active investment market with the more participation from the institutional investors.
Developers will react to prevailing rents and capital values when they appear to signal a profitable opportunity. If prices rise, more developers will respond to these signals, the aggregate flow of supply into the market increases.
These new spaces will meet the requirements of the occupiers and investors e.g. floor plate size, specification and network connectivity requirements
Real estate service providers such as property consultants played an important role in the whole process by aligning their service standards to the requirements of the regional and global clients.
It is envisioned that the RCEP will open up markets and help in the recovery post Covid-19 pandemic. With increased economic activities, it will give rise to more derived demand for various real estate spaces thereby leading to an improved property market performance in the future.
Millennials now make up over a third
of the workplace and overwhelmingly value flexibility in where, when and
how to work. And top talent has been increasingly clustering in dense
urban areas and has been unwilling to commute to suburban office parks
Many changes are expected following the signing of the
world's largest free trade agreement — the Regional Comprehensive
Economic Partnership (RCEP) — including more trade between China and
Malaysia, and broad restructuring of Asian supply chains, government
officials from China and Malaysia said during the Malaysia-China
Business Forum on Wednesday.
Azmin showing the RCEP agreement document during the signing ceremony witnessed by Muhyiddin on Nov 15. – fotoBERNAMA\
ON behalf of the Government of Malaysia, I signed the historic Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) agreement together with 14 other RCEP participating countries (RPCs).
Being an integral part of the week-long 37th Asean Summit, led by Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, the signing of the RCEP agreement represents the high point of the summit which was convened virtually in its entirety.
Witnessing this momentous occasion, the prime minister said that the signing signifies to the world that Asean, with its five Free Trade Agreement (FTA) partners, places utmost priority on regional economic integration that facilitates cross-border trade, investments and the easing of non-tariff measures.
The signing is the culmination of eight years of arduous and protracted negotiations involving 31 rounds of negotiations, eight ministerial meetings and four summits.
Undoubtedly, it represents a significant and imperative milestone in the integration and revitalisation of economies of the 15 parties.
Further, this will also be a testament to the strengthening of the multilateral trading system as well as upholding the development agenda in the WTO.
Being the largest FTA in the world, covering 15 countries with 2.2 billion people or nearly a third (29.7%) of the world’s population, RCEP represents US$24.8bil or almost a third (28.9%) of the world’s GDP based on World Bank’s 2018 data.
With different economic development levels of all parties, RCEP will contribute to sustaining Malaysia as a preferred trading hub and investment destination.
To Malaysian businesses, it will mean tariff elimination and reduction for merchandise goods, including the facilitation of export and import of goods among the RCEP countries.
Service providers including e-commerce will be able to enjoy greater market access in terms of cross-border supply and establishing commercial presence in the RCEP markets.
In addition, RCEP will promote, facilitate and protect the investment climate of participating countries within the region. This also includes information exchange and promotion of transparency measures to facilitate business and investment within the RCEP area.
Realising that SMEs play a pivotal role to the backbone of every economies, RCEP could provide a level playing field between developed and least developed countries.
There is a specific chapter on SMEs providing provisions for information exchange and promotion of transparency measures to facilitate business and investment within the region, including providing economic and technical cooperation especially to SMEs.
RCEP can be an economic recovery tool against Covid-19 which will help to ensure opening of markets as well as uninterrupted supply chain.
The RCEP amalgamates and streamlines the existing Asean Plus One FTAs involving Japan, South Korea, China, Australia and New Zealand into an inclusive and comprehensive agreement that will enhance inter and intra-regional trade and investment, strengthen regional value chains, as well as facilitate transparency, information sharing and harmonisation of technical regulations and standards.
RCEP reflects our strong commitment for international trade, connectivity, rules-based multilateral trading system and enhancing free flow of trade and investment.
Datuk Seri Mohamed Azmin Ali Senior Minister Minister of International Trade and Industry
More than two dozen psychiatrists Think Trump is dangerous and unfit for office
The Chinese are making physical and psychological preparations for a US-initiated war
US President Donald Trump arrives to speak in the Brady Briefing Room at
the White House, in Washington DC on Thursday. Democrat Joe Biden is
leading Trump in the race for the 270 electoral votes as of press time.
Photo: AFP
China has been prepared for a "final act of the madness" from the Trump administration and its staged hysteria on China-related issues, as it is highly likely that the incumbent US president will take much more extreme measures on issues such as the South China Sea, the island of Taiwan and China's high tech sector, the moves which are also seen as "setting obstacles" for Biden in his foreign policies, experts said.
After imposing new restrictions on US investment in 31 Chinese companies and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's remarks of denying Taiwan island is part of China, US President Trump will enact a series of hardline policies during his final 10 weeks, including a crackdown on China over so-called "forced labor" in Xinjiang, as well as sanctions on officials and companies with connections to Hong Kong, according to US news site axios.com.
The move also aims to cement Trump's legacy on China, the media report said, citing senior US officials. His political legacies on China will be widely known for its toughness including the launching of a yearlong trade war, leading the global suppression against Chinese high tech companies, smear and blame campaign over the coronavirus epidemic, and consulate closure. During his four-year tenure, the China and US relationship has hit its lowest point in decades, while his all-out anti-China stance has been supported by GOP and his voters.
"Being tough on China is seen as Trump's diplomatic achievement, which has been widely applauded in the US. Any turnaround at the point would be seen as a 'slap in the face' and it's now his final chance to play this card to the maximum extent," Xin Qiang, deputy director of the Center for US Studies at Fudan University, told the Global Times on Monday.
While Trump refused to concede the US election, tweeting that Biden "won" but that the election was rigged, thousands of his supporters protested in downtown Washington DC over the weekend, according to media reports. They also chanted Trump's campaign slogan such as "Make America Great Again" as the number of COVID-19 cases in the country crossed the 11-million mark, "reaching yet another grim milestone," some reports said.
Some Chinese experts believed that Trump does not want to disappoint his supporters, and continuing to be tough on China-related matter is one of his strategies, which has also been echoed by some of his "anti-China" group including Pompeo, FBI Director Christopher Wray, Attorney General William Barr and National Security Advisor Robert O'Brien.
China urged the US to manage the differences on the basis of mutual respect and explore cooperation in reciprocity but will firmly defend its own interests of sovereignty, security and development, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said on reports about Trump will come up with final measures targeting Chinese firms and human rights issues.
A healthy and stable China-US relationship is in line with the fundamental interests of people from the two countries, which also echoes common expectation of the international community, Zhao said.
The Trump administration is also expected to stage its final hysteria toward China by coming up with measures to stir up conflicts in the South China Sea, the Taiwan island, and may launch a crackdown on more Chinese scientific and research staff, Xin predicted. "It's also likely that the US will shut down all the Confucius Institutes in America, casting shadow over future people-to-people exchanges between China and the US," he said.
A trap for Biden?
Diao Daming, an associate professor at the Renmin University of China in Beijing, told the Global Times on Monday that "Although Trump is becoming a lame duck president in his last days in the White House, he can still create more legacies by signing executive orders, although the executive organs under different departments are unlikely to cooperate."
"Trump is actually setting a trap or planting a landmine for the Biden administration," Shen Yi, a professor at the School of International Relations and Public Affairs of Fudan University, told the Global Times.
According to the White House website, "the Executive Order on Addressing the Threat from Securities Investments that Finance Communist Chinese Military Companies" that the Trump administration issued on Thursday will take effect on January 11.
"The date tells everything. By that time, the election will be concluded with a final result, so Trump is throwing a problem into the hands of Biden - if Biden cancels the order, Trump can assert Biden is a Panda Hugger [a Western politician who is being supportive to China]; if Biden keeps the executive order, Trump believes that China would be disappointed and hit back, so the China-US ties will remain tense or even get worse," Shen said on Monday.
Before the election, Trump made great efforts to stigmatize China as he thought the COVID-19 epidemic situation was the biggest obstacle to his reelection, and after the election, he has become more angry as he believes it was the coronavirus that made him lose the reelection, so he has directed his anger toward China again, Diao said.
Shen said that before the COVID-19 pandemic, Trump made many friendly remarks about China and the Chinese national leader, "but he is such an emotional and unpredictable person that we can't use a normal person's mentality to judge him. The current hostility toward China and the friendly remarks of the past are all the reflections of his unusual personality."
Joe Biden in Beijing on December 5, 2013 Photo: AFP
A long fight
Between retaliation against US provocations and de-escalation of tensions with the US, Chinese analysts said China needs to be careful and cautious, and there will be no surprises as long as China is fully prepared for a long fight with the US whether it is governed by Trump or Biden.
On one hand, China needs to precisely retaliate against the Trump administration and make it feel the pain if the provocations harm Chinese core interests; on the other hand, if the provocations are just bluffing with no concrete damage, China can ignore them and focus on communicating with Biden's team to minimize the damages, Diao noted.
"The current situation is even more complicated than the time before and during the election," because sometimes it will be hard to tell which force is behind the new provocations and offensives between November and January, Diao said, "so China's retaliation against the US should precisely hit the Trump administration, and minimize the difficulty for fixing the bilateral ties with the next administration."
The US military is unlikely to support the "final madness" of the Trump administration as they know the risks of a war with China, but in the fields of trade and investment, Trump is likely to leave some legacies, and the Biden administration would also likely inherit these legacies and use them as leverage to bargain with China, Diao further noted.
Shen said that "we can't expect Biden to cancel all policies made by the Trump administration. That would be na?ve. China is fully prepared for more conflicts with the new administration. The Biden administration will only fix Trump's policies if it finds them damaging US interests. Being prepared for a long fight is always the wise choice for China."
The US is a real tiger on the global stage, but when it
comes close to China's coastal waters and touches China's core
interests, it becomes a paper tiger. With just over two months left for
the Trump administration, any attempt to flex its muscle or flaunt will
receive embarrassment and humiliation. China is not a badge of honor for
the US political elite to daub.
The Chinese people don't want to be involved in trouble
after the US election. But we must make the Trump administration know
that we had not hesitated to fight back their provocations during the
peak of their rule, nor will we be reluctant to strike back when
necessary in the coming days. Now may be their craziest time, but we
know it's also their most vulnerable time. They lack mobilization
abilities to promote extreme confrontation with China.
May 24, 2016 ... Chris Hong, who runs two kindergartens-cum-daycare centres in Subang Jaya,
said she and her staff looked after 40 to 50 children from 8am to ...
