Build and they will come. Indeed, they did. Millions of them. To be exact, some three million perhaps even more.

They helped build the 'fields of dreams' that put Malaysia on the global map. The Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Petronas Twin Towers, Formula One circuit, Putrajaya, major highways you name it, they built it.

Now, however, they are no longer wanted. That's what the government would like to think. But soon after undertaking a costly deportation exercise of our undocumented foreign workers, Putrajaya was forced to make a U-turn.

On receiving complaints from employers who have been hooked on these cheap and illegal labourers, the government said these workers could return to their jobs in Malaysia after they have properly obtain re-entry permit.

Still, the exodus has created immense sufferings families were broken up, at least three Filipino children and 24 Indonesians have reportedly died of dehydration and contagious diseases in overcrowded makeshift centres.

Outrage

In the process, we have irked the people of two neighbouring countries. Citizens of both Indonesia and the Philippines are incensed by media reports on how their compatriots were herded into crammed and squalid detention centres before being deported.

The TV footage of a mother weeping over her dead baby in the Philippines was particularly damaging to our reputation as a caring nation. One Filipino senator went as far as calling the exercise 'ethnic cleansing', while others invoked Manila's claim over Sabah, arguing that Britain had no right to hand over the state to Malaysia in 1963.

Philippines' Foreign Affairs Secretary Blas F Ople decried the apparent gap between the undertakings made by Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar during his visit to Kuala Lumpur early this month.

Both leaders assured him that there would be a humane and orderly treatment of illegal Filipino migrants especially those in Sabah.

"It seems the good intentions of the federal officials in Kuala Lumpur were not being matched by the actions and omissions of the local authorities in Sabah," he lamented.

So what have we achieved from this exercise? Not only have we unwittingly committed a policy flip-flop the crackdown has forced our construction sites to a standstill and those deported can now return we have also enraged the people of two nations.

Clever, no?

Miserable failure

For years, we have illegal immigrants living in our midst. Little action was taken. We have seen squatter colonies mushroomed in our backyards. Our authorities turned a blind eye. We knew major construction sites were populated with these workers. But these, we were told, were national projects.

How is it that our police and military have failed so miserably in keeping our borders from the intrusion of illegal migrants? How is it that we have failed to stop a mass of humanity from walking through our borders?

The answer is simple corruption. Worse still, corruption at all levels of our society, involving the key ministries in charge of importing these labourers, employers, labour recruitment agencies and law enforcement officers.

The reported death of the deportees shouldn't surprise anyone. Much has been written about the appalling conditions of our illegal immigrants detention camps, or 'hell holes' as some would prefer to call them.

In 1995, I helped exposed the death of 59 detainees in the Semenyih detention camp near Kajang, Selangor. They died of malnutrition and infectious diseases. The government later confirmed that 71 had indeed perished.

Business as usual

That was eight years ago. Nothing, however, has changed. We still regard our migrant labourers as nothing more than human cargo. The Filipinos who demonstrated in front of the Malaysian Embassy in Manila this week were right one of their placards stressed that 'illegal workers are human beings too'.

A Malaysian who has seen our treatment of foreign workers over the years both in good and bad economic times has this to say:

"It is not how many tall buildings we have which make us a great nation. It is how we treat our fellow human beings which make us a great nation."

Certainly some food for thought as we celebrate our Merdeka tomorrow.