The Covid-19 pandemic has wrought unprecedented misery upon communities throughout the world, affecting the most vulnerable and the poor and under-privileged.
The ECM Libra Foundation – which since its inception 2004 – has worked with these exposed communities by providing thousands with means to an education, decided to focus on these same communities to provide them food and urgent supplies which they had been cut off from by the pandemic.
Working with non-government organisations, the Foundation provided support through direct financial aid but largely providing food and meals to many who were lucky to go to bed with one meal a day.
The ECM Libra Foundation also funded purchase of essentials for front-liners such as PPEs, sanitisers, gloves, ventilators and housed them in hotels near the hospitals treating Covid-19 patients.
In March 2020, the Foundation donated RM500,000.00 to The Edge Covid-19 Equipment Fund. The money was used to purchase ventilators for hospitals as well as protective suits and masks for front-line health care workers.
Recognizing front-line health care workers’ long hours shifts and having to sleep in hospital corridors and stretchers, the Foundation with the support of the Ormond Group provided free accommodation for health care workers from the Kuala Lumpur General Hospital (HKL). All 130 rooms at the Tune Hotel PWTC, which is nearest to HKL were provided to medical staff of HKL amounting to 4,500 hotel nights.
In April 2020, the Faculty of Engineering and Technology undergraduates of Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR) in their efforts to help, produced and donated 3D printing face shield for front liners at several hospitals. The foundation sponsored the cause which saw the students produce a batch of 1,500 face shields and distributed to needy front-line health workers in Negri Sembilan.
In addition, working with 11 different NGOs, the Foundation has sponsored monthly groceries and essential foodstuff to thousands of families throughout the country – with the exception of Sarawak – to ensure they do not go hungry. The Foundation also raised RM 760,000.00 in funds through friends and corporates by organising a grudge squash match between two business tycoons – Airasia’s Tan Sri Tony Fernandes and property magnate Tan Sri Salim Fateh Din.
