Before Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, who also chairs the cabinet committee on foreign workers announces the proposed amnesty package for illegal workers, there are a few issues he must urgently consider.
We can understand his rationale to reduce illegals in the country and to make it easy for them to leave. But what repercussion will it create to employers? Unlike outsourcing companies, employers that take workers directly have to bear huge cost, an average of RM3,000 for a person to bring them in.
By making it easy for them to get out or legalise, are we not punishing the employers that bring them in for direct employment? For what sin? For supporting economic activities?
When workers run away, the employers loose between RM3,000 - 5,000 per person. If the run is reported, employers get condemned again with repatriating expenses. With an amnesty such as the government is proposing, the illegals get an easy way out. Pay RM400 and get away. Many of them can turn a new leaf by paying a fresh levy.
In such a case, are we solving the illegal problem or encouraging foreign workers to run away from employers? What kind of a solution is this? Without foreign workers, some sectors like 3D (difficult, dangerous, dirty) will have to close their activities. By right, the sector that is most difficult to get locals, the levies should be the lowest. But it is the opposite with authorities in Malaysia.
One such sector suffering most is the cargo sector that has been frozen for a while. What logic does the Government use? Do we want to close down our ports? Does the government want to make cargo handling so expensive that ships better go transits at neighbouring ports?
It seems decision made at the highest level are not based on real grassroots level information. Some business vultures looking to make money for themselves are misleading our decision makers and influencing national policies to benefit themselves. That’s why 90 percent of illegal workers and the human trafficking problem are said to have been created by ‘outsourcing companies’ mostly owned by politicians basking in the corridors of powers.
The illegal immigrant is definitely a gigantic issue in Malaysia, but who is really responsible for it? How’s that, other country like in the gulf can manage it better but in Malaysia, the problem gets bigger by the day. Is our Immigration incompetent?
Most of the illegals pay their way out when caught. Are our police really so corrupted? Or is the system in place for managing foreign workers is so rotten that it, instead of addressing the problem, is actually creating and multiplying the illegals?
We hear there are syndicates in major cities who supply forged travel documents for illegals wanting to go home without falling into Immigration hands. Some of the businesses are run by illegals themselves. The smarter ones get married to locals and the local spouse also helps them with illegal activities. Sit around at any of the state immigration offices dealing with visas and permits, and you will find so many of them clamouring onto one another.
Hospitals complain their bills are not paid. Illegals arrested become a burden to us to house and feed. Some workers are not even received on arrival into the country. Does one need a degree in rocket science to figure out why these employers who applied for them cannot be traced and punished? Is the Immigration and Home Ministry so terribly incompetent?
Employers are now condemned to buy addition medical insurance for the workers. It is already so difficult to run a business these days with all sorts of costs going up. Yet, whenever the government comes up with newer ideas, they end up raising the cost of doing business. It is the employer that must suffer.
The government makes the employers pay for the workers’ levies. Then we are asked to let them keep their passport. So, when irresponsible employers, at zero cost, pinch foreign workers by luring them with extra pay and entice them to run away from their legitimate employers, what remedy does the government have for the employers who pay so much to bring them in, then loose them to illegal employment?
How can these companies recover their costs? Amnesty saves the felon, but the innocent employers end up paying the price. Why can’t the government be fair to employers too?
The biggest culprit for sure are the ‘outsourcing companies’ who bring in foreign workers and then trade them as commodities or rent them to businesses who go for lesser hassle, no responsibility and cheaper labour or indulge directly or indirectly in human traffickings . Yet we see our Government openly protecting these evil companies?
Why can’t we learn from the system in Gulf States. The punishment for illegals are severe, so they don’t dare. Only companies that bring them in are allowed to have them as their workers. Once an illegal is arrested, and proven that he ran away from his own employer, they receive a mandatory punishment of at least 10 lashes of cane.
And yes, a biometric database will help a lot. But this information must be shared with Asean and Gulf States because if one commits a felony anywhere in the region, the felon will be blacklisted throughout the region. That can serve as an effective deterrent.
Have pity to employers please, who is the actual loser and the real victim in the illegal workers issue. And nothing in our laws presently protects or safeguards the interests of employers.
Abolish ‘outsourcing companies’, only allow direct employment by companies and make their embassies responsible for any crimes perpetrated by their citizens in this peaceful and prosperous country.
