He estimates that he has lost millions in dalasi during this ongoing pandemic.
Since its first discovery in Wuhan, China in December 2019, the global pandemic has spread rapidly affecting millions of lives. The exponential nature at which it spread forced World Health Organisation to declare it a global pandemic.
The Gambia registered its first case on March 17, 2020, an imported case but this increased to 3 confirmed cases (all imported) resulting in one death within the space of one week.
“The covid-19 pandemic has heavily hit my business very hard. Since the pandemic started it has been hard on my business but I thank God for everything,” said Alhaji Muhammed Morr-Jobe, proprietor of MJ Finance Bureau de Change.
He indicated that the covid-19 disease is just like an antelope which Allah is using to show us that he is still in control of the world.
“I have shut down about six of my branches in the tourism industrial area as a result of the pandemic. I am still paying the rent of those offices because I thought that the pandemic would’ve gone for one year but it has now been over two years and I am still continuing paying those offices rents.”
He revealed that some of his branches aside from the tourism industrial areas are still in operation, saying the gains from those offices is what they are using to pay their staff salaries.
“There is no longer profit in the business since the emergence of the covid-19 pandemic. I lost millions of dalasi since the emergence of the pandemic and all we now get is used to pay for our staff salary.”
With a career spanning for 40 years in the financial business, Morr-Jobe emphasised that his experience in business is what is keeping his trade alive.
He revealed that he is not only into financial business, but also investing in the country’s poultry and real estate agency as well.
As the deputy chairman of the National People’s Party in Banjul, Jobe thus called on Gambians to rally behind President Barrow’s National Development Agenda as the country prepares to go to the polls on December 4th.
As the first Gambian to establish a bureau de change after opening MJ Finance Bureau de Change in 1986, Jobe is currently the vice President of the Association of License Bureau.
