Locked up for more than a month, fed only twice a day and physically abused. This is the plight of two Bangladeshi workers who had come to Malaysia in search of a better future.


 The workers, identified only as AH and MR, related their sufferings at the hands of a labour outsourcing company to the Human Rights Commission (Suhakam) yesterday.


 <img align="right" alt="" border="0" height="214" hspace="5" src="http://mk-cdn.mkini.net/90/6443e8b0ad59e5d11a4613a67ba88318.jpg" style="WIDTH: 320px; HEIGHT: 214px" width="320"/>
 "We want help. Please help us," the two workers told Suhakam comissioner Chew Siew Kioh at the commission's headquarters in Kuala Lumpur.


 It is said that former deputy home minister Megat Junid Megat Ayob is a shareholder of the company.


 "I was kept there for one month and 11 days and I was locked up, I could not communicate with anybody. Some of us had mobile (phones) but the agent took them away mobile," said MR.


 "They locked us up from the outside and didn't allow us to come out. After one month and 11 days, they gave us jobs. They didn't give us proper food, they only fed us twice a day," he added.


 AH pointed to his bruised ear and with the help of a translator said he was slapped repeatedly. He then pointed to his leg and said he was kicked as well.


 The Bangladeshi, who was visibly upset, complained that his work and travel documents were taken away from him.


 "Our documents are important to us. If we don't have those documents, what are we going to do?" he said.


 He then asked the Suhakam commissioner to help him get back the RM11,000 he paid to the agent who arranged to get him a job in Malaysia.


 Chew promised to raise the matter with the other commissioners.


 Meanwhile, workers' rights group Tenaganita director Irene Fernandez, who took the two workers to Suhakam, said they had been treated like prisoners.


 She told reporters that when they went to the place where the workers were being kept the day before, gangsters had surrounded their car and threatened them.


 On being asked by reporters how they managed to come out of their compound today, the two workers simply responded: "We ran."


 What had happened to AH and MR is not an isolated incident. There are about 500 of their colleagues sharing the same experience.


 
 
 No need for such companies
 
 




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 Earlier, at a consultation titled 'A new strategy in labour flexibilisation and its impact on migrant workers', Fernandez presented a report on her fact-finding mission called 'outsourcing in labour trafficking in migrant labour?'


 She attributed the mission as arising from "concerns that large number of migrant workers were being stranded with no work and no salaries."


 She said these migrant workers were recruited in Bangladesh and made to pay a sum between RM6,000 to RM12,000 to come to Malaysia for a job.


 They would then be asked to work for one to two weeks, following which there would be no more employment.


 "These outsourcing companies who bring in the Bangladeshi workers are not being held accountable for their actions" said Fernandez.


 She explained that the 223 outsourcing companies in Malaysia benefit from the sum of money paid by the workers to come to Malaysia, but fail to provide proper jobs or keep the workers in proper living conditions.


 According to Fernandez, a Home Ministry official told her that he can only take action on outsourcing companies "on an administrative level" as that is only his scope of jurisdiction.


 "However, in two months, a re-approval can be made," she said, adding, "That is exactly the problem."


 She explained that these companies are not being held accountable for their actions and the only action that can be taken against them is to have their licence revoked.


 <img align="left" height="278" hspace="5" src="http://mk-cdn.mkini.net/90/dd29f3e0f57c031d0b74611d1cac808a.jpg" width="200"/>
 M Ramachelvam, chairman of the Bar Council ad hoc committee on the Immigration Act, said the government should legislate a model contract which states the responsibilities of the employers and employees.


 "This should be enforceable for all migrant workers across the sectors," he added.


 According to Fernandez, there is no need for outsourcing companies.


 "They are just another layer to make money out of foreign workers," she said.


 Fernandez and Ramachelvam expressed hope for a comprehensive policy to protect the rights of these workers who currently total 60,000 in Malaysia according to statistics from the Home Ministry.

Locked up for more than a month and physically abused by their recruitment agent. That's the plight of hundreds of Bangladeshi workers who came here to seek greener pastures.


No greener pastures for migrant workers

~RM12

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