Jakarta – Shopping malls in Jakarta will likely cease operation for a second time when large-scale social restrictions (PSBB) are reinstated in the capital on Monday, an official has said.
"In the early stage of PSBB back in March, the Jakarta administration also temporarily shut down shopping malls," Jakarta Tourism and Creative Economy Agency acting head Gumilar Ekalaya said on Thursday.
The malls' daily needs retailers, such as supermarkets, might be allowed to stay open, he said, while restaurants inside shopping malls might be permitted to provide delivery services only.
The Jakarta administration will postpone its plan to reopen movie theaters in the city.
"We'll put off the cinema reopening plan," Gumilar said, adding that officials were awaiting the issuance of a gubernatorial regulation detailing the PSBB measures.
Indonesian Cinema Owners Association (GPBSI) head Djonny Syafruddin said the association was ready to follow the Jakarta administration's instructions.
"We've learned a lot over the past seven months. We'll follow the government, as it knows the situation better," Djonny said as quoted by kompas.com. "We're in tatters right now, but we should not put blame on anybody," he added.
Previously, Djonny said the association had established several health protocol plans for the reopening of cinemas and had presented them to the city administration.
"We've gone through a long process, such as making a proposal and presenting it. We just need to wait for the right timing," he said.
Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan announced on Wednesday that the administration would reimpose a stricter PSBB policy as COVID-19 cases in the capital continued to rise. He said the policy would come into effect on Monday.
As of Friday, Jakarta had confirmed 51,635 COVID-19 cases, with 11,696 active cases and 1,365 fatalities.
The capital city has seen a spike in new infections in the past few weeks, which has strained the city's healthcare system.
The isolation and intensive care unit (ICU) bed occupancy rates in the capital reached 77 percent and 83 percent respectively on Wednesday. The city has 4,053 isolation room beds and 528 ICU beds remaining.
The Jakarta Health Agency predicted that the city would run out of hospital beds for COVID-19 patients by December if cases continued to increase at the current pace and if no intervention were made to increase hospital capacity. (nal)