24 March 2020

Grit continues to carefully monitor events and government advice relating to COVID-19. The safety and wellbeing of Grit’s people and their families, our tenants, communities and wider stakeholders remains our top priority while we work hard to contain and mitigate the potential effects from the pandemic that continues to evolve.

The Group supports #stayathome and #flattenthecurve initiatives and is actively encouraging all Mauritians to heed government advice to work from home to contain the pandemic.

The Company operates across a number of sectors in eight different countries. An internal steering committee, constituting executive and senior managers, has been tasked with monitoring developments across all our jurisdictions and is in constant communication with key tenants and operational staff and is providing ongoing feedback to the Board.

We are closely monitoring the recommendations issued by the World Health Organisation, various governments and relevant authorities and are complying with these across our operations.

Latest updates

Mauritius:

• On Thursday 19 March, the government announced a full national confinement, initially for a period of 2 weeks.
• Borders have been shut to foreign nationals and any returning Mauritian residents are required to attend a 14-day quarantine period.
• A full Government programme including wage support, funding lines and business support is currently being enacted.

Mozambique:

• Mozambique has announced its first official case of Covid-19 coronavirus and the Maputo executive has asked its external partners for US$700 million to help address the negative impacts of the pandemic.
• The central bank announced the “introduction of foreign currency credit lines for banks and relaxation of the conditions for restructuring bank customer credits” to mitigate the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Grit staff in Maputo have pre-emptively started working remotely since 23 March.

Morocco:

• On Thursday, March 19, Moroccan authorities declared a state of emergency due to the ongoing coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and is restricting movements. Moroccans are not permitted to leave their homes unless for food or medicine shopping, or to go to work with required permits from authorities.
• The government also implemented closures of restaurants, cafés, theaters, and cinemas nationwide. 

Kenya:

• As of 23 March, 15 confirmed cases in Kenya. Government offices, businesses and companies have been encouraged to allow employees to work from home, with the exception of employees working in critical or essential services.

Senegal:

• On Monday 23rd March declared a state of emergency, imposing a dusk-to-dawn curfew and closing its border for a period of 21 days.
• On 18th March Senegal had already suspended international commercial flights.

Zambia:

• After announcing 3 confirmed cases, the government has now closed schools and implemented restrictions on foreign travel, including rescheduling all avoidable travel and setting two to 14-day quarantine for travelers coming from “high-risk” nations if symptomatic, as well as health screenings at all entry points to the country.

Botswana:

• The government of Botswana has introduced a number of precautionary measures to limit the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, including placing a temporary ban on visas for nationals from countries affected and a number of land border closures.
• Suspension of public gatherings of more than 100 people in effect for 30 days

Ensuring Business Continuity

All Grit staff are currently working remotely and have been equipped with the necessary procedures, technology, tools, support and guidance to do so. The Company continues to remain completely accessible to our stakeholders via telephone, video conference facilities and email and operations are running as normal.

The coming weeks

Events and official advice are likely to continue to change at a rapid pace. We will continue to monitor events closely and update our stakeholders accordingly. By working closely together, we aim to minimize any disruption, impacts and effects to our business communities, employees and various stakeholders.

For further information, please contact [email protected]