General Manager at Liberty Industries, actress Kai MacCarthy has appealed to the government to ease restrictions on drinking bars as the non-opening is adversely affecting the beverage industry.

She said more people could also lose their jobs if the restriction continues adding that “we cannot continue to pay salaries when we are not producing.”

According to the General Manager, the company’s flagship brand Kpoo Keke had recorded very low sales since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Our major selling joints are the bars and if they are not operating, we cannot produce,” she said in an interview with the Ghanaian Times.

“We have lost thousands of Ghana cedis within the period and though we had already sacked a few workers, we intend to reduce our numbers further if the current situation persists,” she added.

“Normal bars do not operate with over 100 people except for some pubs and night clubs. So they could observe the necessary health protocols, operate with less people and there would not be a spread of the virus,” she explained.

“These are difficult times and people also need to work to take care of their families so there should be a way to get bars which employ a lot of people to get back into business,” she stressed.

Going forward, she said, it would be difficult for companies to immediately scale up after the pandemic as a lot had already been lost.

“It will probably take a year or more to bounce back as a business after COVID-19,” she said.

She urged the public to patronise their new product the ‘Kpoo Keke Sanitiser’ to help stop the spread of the virus.