PCCI Backtracks, Says Another Lockdown Not Needed At This Time

The Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) clarified on Wednesday night, July 28, that  it is not endorsing another lockdown at this time, reversing what president emeritus George Barcelon said earlier in the day.

In a strongly worded statement posted on PCCI’s official Facebook page about 12 hours after Barcelon spoke at a virtual forum, PCCI acting president Edgardo Lacson said, “Such a decision will cause the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs again, not to mention business losses of enterprises, which our citizens can ill afford.”

At the Pandesal Forum held early on Wednesday, business leaders including Presidential adviser on entrepreneurship Joey Concepcion, Federation of Filipino-Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry or FFCCCII President Henry Lim Bon Liong, and Barcelon discussed the possibility of a “circuit-breaker” lockdown to head off a surge caused by the Covid-19 Delta variant.

Barcelon agreed to the early imposition of a two-week lockdown, but would want the private sector to be given time to prepare for it. “The issue is really mobility. You can have a severe lockdown, but we should be cognizant that the transport of essentials is important,” he said.

Concepcion had suggested that such a lockdown is better implemented sooner rather than later. The idea is to “sacrifice” two weeks in August to prevent another strict quarantine in the fourth quarter of the year, which is the important period for many businesses.

“This is the quarter where consumers spend for Christmas. This is the quarter where election spending is expected to pour in," Concepcion said. “We have to save the fourth quarter, or else if this collapses and we have the lockdown in the fourth quarter – any time in October or November, God willing this will not happen – then the entire year will be destroyed for many, especially MSMEs (micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises).”

He also mentioned that August is an opportune time to impose a circuit breaker as it’s known as “ghost month” in the Chinese calendar, a time when business deals are avoided and the markets quiet down. In addition, heavy monsoon rains this season have dampened consumer sentiment.

Without naming names, Lacson claimed earlier reports just “misquoted” one of their leaders – which isn’t accurate. Barcelon, who is currently the PCCI’s director for the utilities and legislative unit as well as chairman of the Philippine Exporters Confederation (PhilExport), was in agreement with the other two speakers throughout the forum.

“We (the three business leaders) are in total agreement that if we are going to do a lockdown, let’s not wait. Let’s nip it while we can,” Concepcion said.

The disagreement underscores the difficult challenge facing the Interagency Task Force and the business community.

The emergence of the highly transmissible Delta variant has prompted renewed restrictions in other countries, clouding recovery prospects even for economies with high vaccination rates including the United States.

“Even medical doctors are divided on the Delta variant that although it is highly contagious, it is not fatal,” Lacson said in his statement.

“The idea is to open the economy and allow greater mobility of people while taking stock of the basic health protocols to observe. The virus will be with us for months, maybe years, and we have no choice but to live with it. This is how other countries have fought the virus. Lockdowns will cause even greater hardships for our people,” he said.

Lacson further said that knee-jerk reaction to declare a lockdown again – a declaration of enhanced community quarantine in the National Capital Region for example – will be disastrous to the economy which is already reeling from losses arising from months of lockdowns.

PCCI leaders said government should focus instead on accelerating vaccination of the population especially that millions of vaccine doses have recently arrived in the country.

PCCI recommended to incentivize people who have been fully vaccinated such as being allowed to travel across provincial borders or be allowed to enter malls and restaurants freely.

Militant labor also rejected calls for the imposition of hard lockdown to control the spread of the Delta variant in the country.

Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) stressed many workers will go hungry again if the government will impose hard lockdown without assurance of social measures.

He said it is sickening that the government does not know any other solution to the pandemic but a lockdown.

There should be mass testing, contact tracing as well as safe and speedy vaccination of citizens, KMU said in a statement.

KMU insisted that hard lockdown will only lead to massive displacement of workers like what happened last year.

Due to hard lockdown, KMU said, a huge number of MSMEs have shut down, leading to the displacement of over a million workers nationwide.