Essay Writing

Corona Virus Jail

It’s impossible to find a person who hasn’t heard of the coronavirus outbreak. The outbreak has created a global health crisis that has had a deep impact on the way we perceive our world and our everyday lives.  Indonesia citizens are also struggling from this disease, and, to date, there is more than 56.300 of confirmed cases. According to the official statistics, many people have died worldwide, and the number continues to grow. Economic considerations are always important for governments when taking any action, including in the current fight to contain the threat of the coronavirus pandemic. But governments should not let economics become the prime driver, especially if it means risking people’s health and lives, which are far more important than their livelihoods.
The argument against lockdowns is that it could grind the economy, which is already slowing down, to a complete halt, with severe political and social consequences.

The specter of the 1998 economic recession, followed by mass riots, political crisis and the collapse of the Soeharto regime, is being played out again. This is probably why Jokowi entrusts the handling of the coronavirus mostly to military types and less to public health professionals. He sees the coronavirus through economic and security prisms. The actions the President advocates are likely to have minimal effect on curtailing the spread of the virus, if we go by the experiences of China, Italy, Iran and many European countries where COVID-19 has been most severe. Rather than outright instructions, he limited himself to appealing to people to consider working, studying, and praying at home. He also appealed to people to avoid mass gatherings.

Unfortunately, as soon as Jakarta announced on the weekend that schools were to be closed, many families headed to the Puncak hill resort area and many others headed to their hometowns, apparently considering the situation an opportunity for a vacation. Many domestic flights remained full these past weeks. Clearly the government’s coronavirus message has not fully sunk in for people to feel any sense of real crisis. Mere appeals will not cut it. People will still travel rather than stay home and if they have it will spread the virus multiple times to others along the way. Most schools have heeded the appeal but many employers are divided, with many companies staying open if only to ensure steady income for their workers even if business is slow.

Critics of lockdowns rightly point out that 55 percent of workers in Indonesia have no steady income as they are in the informal sector and a lockdown would mean the loss of their livelihoods. They would be severely hit by a lockdown. The economy is already going down, with or without lockdowns, but failing to curtail people’s movement would mean more people getting infected and even dying. Central Java Governor Ganjar Pranowo, Jokowi’s political ally, got it right when he said, as quoted in Tempo daily: “We need to save people’s lives to keep the economy running. If economics remain our focus, everything will die.” Yes, there will be severe economic hardships and the question is: How do we handle this?

Sri Mulyani expressed confidence that Indonesia can draw lessons from the 1998 economic recession to weather this coming crisis. Lest Jokowi forget, Indonesia has also learned valuable lessons in running social safety net programs for us to be able to deal with the next economic and social hardships.

Indonesia has the necessary administrative infrastructure, with neighborhood and community associations everywhere ready to run the social safety net programs. Jokowi of all people should have confidence in the gotong-royong (mutual assistance) spirit of our people. But isn’t a lockdown going to be expensive? Yes, but that’s your economic argument again. Indonesia may soon find that the costs of failing to take swift action to stop the COVID-9 spread now could be even more prohibitive.

Going by other countries’ experiences, there are alternatives to lockdowns in stopping the spread of the coronavirus, but the only viable option for Indonesia at this stage is a lockdown. It’s not too late.