NCC to decide on lockdown’s future on April 13: Asad Umar
- By Web Desk -
- Apr 08, 2020
ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Planning and Development Asad Umar on Wednesday said that any decision on lockdown will be made on April 13 in the meeting of National Coordination Committee (NCC), ARY NEWS reported.
It is pertinent to mention here that on April 01, the NCC decided to extend lockdown till April 14 to curb the spread of COVID-19 to cope with the impact of the pandemic.
Talking during ARY NEWS programme ‘Off The Record’, Asad Umar said that the meeting to be headed by prime minister and attended by chief ministers would decide the strategy to be implemented from April 15.
He said that although the coronavirus situation in the country has not worsen like other global countries however, it does not mean they have overcome it.
“The situation could get worse if preventive measures are not adopted,” he said adding that they were reviewing the situation on daily basis to devise a strategy.
The minister said from the day one of the pandemic, the federal government had been stressing the need to assess the situation keeping in view the economic and health risk from the virus.
“We were criticized when we took the decisions considering economic fallout of a complete lockdown across the country,” he said adding that however, now the same critiques were debating over looming threat of unemployment from the lockdown.
Read More: National Command and Control Centre confirms 4,072 coronavirus cases
Asad Umar said that the government has decided to allow operations of certain sectors under a pilot project. “Any decision on opening any sector will be made keeping in view the employment and income factors involved in it,” he said.
The minister said that a guideline was being issued for the sectors that were allowed to operate. “More guidelines will be given if other sectors are allowed to operate in future,” he said.
He said that the government has started disbursing Rs 12,000 among each of the 12 million families from 17,000 separate points established across the country.