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BKPM suspends face-to-face licensing services to contain COVID-19 spread
BKPM head Bahlil Lahadalia explained that the agency would suspend its face-to-face services from March 17 until March 31.
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Permission applicants are at the BKPM One-Stop Integrated Service in Jakarta. BKPM head Bahlil Lahadalia explained that the agency would suspend its face-to-face services from March 17 until March 31. (JP/Ricky Yudhistira)
T
he Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM) will temporarily close its One-Stop Integrated Service (PTSP) licensing outlets to minimize the spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus.
BKPM head Bahlil Lahadalia explained that the agency would suspend its face-to-face services from March 17 until March 31.
"We are doing this [...] to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus. It's only for two weeks," Bahlil said in a press statement on Monday.
Read also: Bank Indonesia, OJK limit direct services as social distancing measure to contain virus
Investors can still use BKPM's online services, contact its call center and send license proposals through postal services, the statement read.
President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo called on Sunday for all citizens to practice what epidemiologists call social distancing to slow the spread of COVID-19 in the country.
“Under the current circumstances, it’s time for us to work from home, study from home and worship at home,” Jokowi said at a press conference at Bogor Palace in West Java on Sunday. “It’s time for us to work together, to help each other, to unite and cooperate. We want this to be a community movement, so that the COVID-19 problem can be addressed to the fullest.”
Read also: Indonesia pledges to safeguard investments as Covid-19 fears grow
Bank Indonesia and the Financial Services Authority (OJK) have asked most of their employees to work from home and have suspended direct services while encouraging the public and stakeholders to use their online and call center services.
The Finance Ministry’s Taxation Directorate General has also suspended direct face-to-face services and is advising all taxpayers to use its online services to file their annual tax returns (SPTs). It also extended the deadline for tax returns from March 31 to April 30 “to provide certainty to individual taxpayers”, it said in a statement on Sunday.
The pneumonia-like illness had infected 134 people in Indonesia with five fatalities recorded as of Monday.
