Category: News

The Malaysian government has said that it will soon implement a system whereby foreign migrant workers will be able to apply for jobs in the South-East Asian nation online.
Speaking to the Malaysian media on Saturday, Malaysian Human Resources Minister M Kulasegaran, said that the government is close to finalising all the preparations to hire foreign migrant labourers, especially from Nepal and Bangladesh, within a few months.

Kulasegaran further said that the Independent Foreign Workers Committee, which was formed to suggest the government the method that needs to be adopted to bring foreign workers, had finalised its report but the government has yet to endorse it. “The Malaysian government is aware of the problems being faced by foreign workers due to the use of middlemen in the hiring process.”

“After the report is endorsed by the cabinet, Malaysian firms or individuals can recruit foreign workers themselves. They will have the option to choose the type of workers they want and from any specific country,” he informed the media.

As per the recommendation of the Human Resources Ministry, now every Malaysian company or individual must deposit 250,000 ringgits with the government as security money. “If a company or individual misbehaves with a worker or does not pay the salary on time or fails to fulfil any legal obligation then the government will use that security deposit to compensate the respective worker,” Kulasegaran further informed.

According to him, the Malaysian government will soon introduce the Malaysian Recruitment Agency (MRA), a job portal, especially focused on migrant workers. Foreign workers will then be able to apply online for any job as per their skills.

“The government plans to address all the difficulties associated with hiring foreign workers in a holistic manner and simplify the entire process,” said Kulasegaran. He added that the MRA must respond to a job query within 48 hours and inform the foreign job aspirant whether they are eligible or not for the applied job. The MRA must also respond to any other query within 48 hours.

Meanwhile, the Nepal government in May last year had temporarily halted sending labourers to Malaysia as workers were being charged excessive fees for related services by private companies, namely Immigration Security Clearance and One Stop Centre. Domestic hiring agencies and workers have been criticising the government’s decision and have urged it to allow workers to go to Malaysia as soon as possible.

Nepali government officials have said that the two governments are working together to open the Malaysian labour market for Nepali migrants as soon as possible.

On October 29 last year, Nepal and Malaysia had signed a bilateral labour pact. The memorandum of understanding states that the employer firms in Malaysia will have to bear recruitment service charges, two-way airfare, visa fee, health check-up fee, security screening and levy charges, among others. The Nepal- Malaysia technical committee is expected to finalise all the legal provisions soon.

Source news from : https://thehimalayantimes.com/business/foreign-workers-can-soon-apply-online-for-malaysian-jobs/

Jabatan Imigresen rampas 1,150 pasport dan PLKS palsu dalam dua serbuan

PUTRAJAYA – Jabatan Imigresen Malaysia merampas 1,150 pasport pelbagai negara dan Pas Lawatan Kerja Sementara (PLKS) palsu yang didalangi warga Bangladesh dan tempatan dalam dua serbuan berasingan di Ampang dan Subang Jaya, Selangor minggu ini.

Ketua Pengarah Jabatan Imigresen, Datuk Khairul Dzaimee Daud berkata, dalam operasi pertama, jabatan tersebut telah menyerbu sebuah rumah di Taman Pandan Ria, Ampang Selasa lalu.

Jelasnya, dalam serbuan itu, sebanyak 110 pasport warga Bangladesh termasuk tiga pasport palsu dirampas, tujuh keping pelekat Jabatan Imigresen Malaysia, 40 keping sijil pendaftaran vendor palsu, enam telefon bimbit dan tiga komputer riba.

“Seramai lapan orang lelaki warganegara berusia dalam lingkungan 30 hingga 46 tahun ditahan. Lima daripada lapan lelaki itu ditahan tiada dokumen perjalanan yang sah manakala dua lagi mempunyai pasport dan seorang memiliki pasport palsu.

“Kita percaya sindiket ini aktif menjalankan kegiatan pemalsuan pasport dan PLKS sejak tiga tahun lalu,” katanya pada sidang akhbar di sini hari ini.

Dalam pada itu, menurut Khairul Dzaimee, dalam serbuan kedua, jabatan itu telah menyerbu sebuah premis di Subang Jaya semalam dan merampas sebanyak 1,140 pasport.

Jelasnya, daripada jumlah itu, 645 pasport pelbagai negara kebanyakannya Bangladesh, 389 pasport tamat tempoh dan enam pasport palsu dirampas.

“Hasil siasatan mendapati, sindiket yang didalangi sembilan warga Bangladesh dan seorang warga tempatan menyediakan PLKS untuk warga asing pada harga RM2,500 hingga RM3,000 dengan menggunakan dokumen yang mencurigakan.

“Sindiket ini juga dipercayai aktif menjalankan kegiatan tersebut sejak enam tahun lalu dan telah memproses permohonan pemalsuan PLKS dari kira-kira 20 syarikat,” katanya.

Tambahnya, dengan tertangkapnya kedua-dua sindiket itu, Jabatan Imigresen menganggarkan mengalami kerugian sebanyak RM7.2 juta dalam tempoh tiga tahun.

Jelasnya, jumlah tersebut dianggarkan daripada pembayaran levi PLKS sektor perkhidmatan sekiranya mereka membuat permohonan pas lawatan itu secara sah kepada Jabatan Imigresen.

Kesemua individu yang ditahan disiasat mengikut Seksyen 55D Akta Imigresen 1959 iaitu membuat atau memalsukan atau meminda endorsement untuk digunakan sebagai visa, permit atau pas.

Mereka berdepan dengan hukuman denda sehingga RM30,000 dan penjara sehingga 10 tahun dan boleh dikenakan sebatan jika sabit kesalahan.

Maklumat Sumber : Facebook Jabatan Imigresen Malaysia

PUTRAJAYA (Feb 28): The joint committee between the Home Ministry and Human Resource Ministry today announced that the multi-tier levy system for foreign workers will begin on Jan 1, 2020.

Home Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said the implementation will take into account aspects of data integration as well the readiness of the Government and employers under the formal sector, particularly agriculture and manufacturing.

In the manufacturing sector, Muhyiddin however said that the foreign workers dependency ratio for the multi-tier levy mechanism was only allowed up to 75 per cent.

“In this case, a committee will be set up to assess the needs of the employers or companies in the manufacturing sector which hire foreign workers beyond the allowed ratio on a case-by-case basis.

“This is to ensure that the company’s operations are not affected,” he said after chairing the meeting with Human Resource Minister M. Kulasegaran here.

Muhyiddin said employers would be informed on the levy system before it being implemented.

“Each level has a different levy. All proposals for the amount of levy have been included in the Foreign Workers’ Management Independent Committee’s report. We cannot disclose it now because the report must get approval from the Cabinet,” he said.

Muhyiddin said the committee also agreed that cooks, kitchen assistants and waiters were allowed to be employed in the restaurant sub-sector.

From Jan 1 to Feb 20, the Immigration Department conducted 2,182 enforcement operations and arrested 148 employers and 7,747 illegal immigrants, he said.

“About 244 employers have been prosecuted between Jan 1 and Dec 31, 2018. In addition, 316 employers were imposed compound fines.

“The Labour Department of Peninsular Malaysia (JTKSM) has also issued notices to 4,677 employers who failed to comply with the Employment Act 1955,” he said.

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The Private Employment Agencies (Amendment) Act 2017 (“Amendments”) came into force on 1 February 2018 and has introduced many new changes and provisions, with the aims of better regulating the activities of private employment agencies and protecting job seekers from being exploited by such agencies.

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2) Private employment agencies must now have the words “Agensi Pekerjaan” (Translation: “Employment Agency”) preceding the name of their company.

3)Private employment agencies operating in Malaysia must have a license under the Act (“License”) before they can carry out any recruiting activity in Malaysia, and the penalties for non-compliance has ben increased to a fine not exceeding RM200,000.00 or imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 years or both.

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DHAKA (The Statesman/Asia News Network): The previous Najib Razak-led Malaysian government had created the manpower syndicate which “monopolised” the recruitment of Bangladeshi workers in the Southeast Asian country, according to officials and documents obtained by The Daily Star.

Following the Andaman boat crisis in 2015, Malaysia’s then home minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said worker recruitment would be done through the private sector instead of the state-level mechanism, G2G.

During bilateral negotiations, Bangladesh had proposed the names of 745 recruiting agencies, but Malaysia selected only 10 without providing any basis for it.

In a letter dated January 9, 2017, Richard Riot anak Jaem, Malaysia’s human resource minister, sent Dhaka the list of the 10.

“So, Bangladesh succumbed to Malaysia’s proposal.”

Additionally, a Bangladeshi-born businessman was allegedly behind the syndicate’s formation, and all 10 agencies in i began charging higher fees, according to industry insiders.

The new G2G Plus deal was signed in early 2016.

The syndicate was thriving until the new Malaysian government suspended recruitment from Bangladesh on September 1 this year following allegations of widespread irregularities against the syndicate.

On October 30, the High Court directed the Bangladesh government to form an inter-ministerial committee to investigate “the monopoly” and submit a probe report in six months.

The court came up with the order and rule following a writ petition filed by 10 recruitment agencies, which contested the arbitrary selection of the other 10 and deprived other licensed agencies of running a lawful trade guaranteed by the constitution.

The syndicate of agents accused is: Noor Ali of Unique Eastern Pvt Ltd, Ruhul Amin of Catharsis International, Ghulam Mustafa of Prantik Travels & Tourism Ltd, Mohammed Bashir of Rabbi International, Zainal Abedin Zafar of Al Islam Overseas, Ruhul Amin of Amin Tours & Travels, ASM Khairul Amin of Career Overseas Consultants Ltd, Tuhin Siddiquue Ome of ISMT Human Resources Development Ltd, Arif Alam of Passage Associates and Shaikh Abdullah of Shanjari International.

Bangladesh and Malaysia are now working to design a new recruitment system.

THE MAN IN THE SHADOWS

After the 10 agencies were selected, leaders of Baira held a meeting at The Vintage Room of Gulshan Club on August 2 last year. They were against the syndicate and wanted to convince one Dato Amin to break it.

Dato Amin or Datuk Seri Mohd Amin Bin Abdul Nor, who was granted Malaysian Permanent Resident status, was the Bangladeshi man considered to be a major player in this industry. The title, Datuk Seri, conferred upon him by the Malaysian government was testament to his importance.

The meeting minutes obtained by this paper show that Baira’s then finance secretary Mohammad Fakhrul Islam asked how paying only RM 5,000 to Amin would ensure that all agents could be engaged in the recruitment business.

Baira then sent a delegation to Amin in Malaysia to convince him to break the syndicate in early August, 2017, but its effort bore no fruit.

Amin is the president and group CEO of a Malaysia-based firm Bestinet that developed, maintains and operates the Foreign Workers Centralised Management System (FWCMS) software, used by the Malaysian home ministry for managing foreign workers and processing their documents.

Amin was also allegedly behind the creation of Synerflux, another IT firm that provided an online registration system Sistem Perkhidmatan Pekerja Asing (SPPA), the only one that can be used to hire Bangladeshi workers.

Former Malaysian home minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi gave the contract to Synerflux under the Official Secrets Act in 2016.

“It was the system through which the recruitment was monopolised and manipulated,” said an agent in Dhaka, wishing not to be named.

Malaysia’s home ministry used the FWCMC for recruitment of foreign workers from all the labour-sending countries, including Bangladesh. However, those wanting Bangladeshi workers, had to again apply through SPPA, according to recruiting agents in Dhaka and Kuala Lumpur.

The SPPA would allocate recruitment jobs only to the 10 agents, and that’s how the total monopoly was created, they told The Daily Star.

Hamidi and first lady Rosmah Mansor are now facing dozens of cases, including that of abusing power in foreign worker recruitment and money laundering.

Meanwhile, Amin has not responded to email queries over the allegations against him.

MONEY NOT MIGRANTS

Noor Ali, managing director of Unique Eastern, one of the 10 recruiting agencies, admitted that the recruitment cost was high but said they had no control over it.

“Jobseekers don’t come to us directly. They go to the brokers…there are six to seven layers of brokers. So, we cannot control the cost,” he said at a press conference organised by the controversial 10 agents at The Westin Dhaka on August 30.

Tian Chua, vice president of People’s Justice Party, a component of the now ruling Pakatan Harapan coalition, said migrant workers’ recruitment was a lucrative business in Malaysia during the previous regime.

“A lot of politically connected agencies are making money out of that,” he told this correspondent at the One World Hotel in Kuala Lumpur on September 18.

“The problem is the people who bring the migrants, don’t employ them. Their objective is only to import migrants and make money against each migrant,” Chua said, adding that the present Malaysian government was working to bring discipline to the foreign worker recruitment sector.

Where an aspirant migrant worker was supposed to pay an official amount of Tk 37,000 as per the G-to-G Plus deal, the agents in collaboration with the sub agents and touts, charged Tk 3.5 to Tk 4 lakh from each of them.

The recruitment cost went up to RM 20,000 or Tk 400,000 from each migrant, Malaysian newspaper The Star reported on June 22 this year.

Considering two lakh Bangladeshis migrated to Malaysia since early 2017, the syndicate raked in Tk 8,000 crore. Of that, Tk 4,000 was laundered to Malaysia, industry insiders in Dhaka and Kuala Lumpur told The Daily Star.

The recruitment process got murkier as Malaysian employers had to depend on the agents or brokers to get the applications for Bangladeshi workers approved.

“Most of the employers had some level of problems in company documents, including financial reports. Therefore, the brokers had to bribe certain home ministry officials for getting the applications approved,” a Bangladeshi broker in Malaysia said.

THE BREAKDOWN

The bribe on average was Malaysian Ringgit (RM) 1,500 per worker. Even, the human resources managers of the employing companies had to be bribed around an average of around RM 1,000, the broker said.

“The agents and sub-agents in Malaysia got an average RM 2,500 as commission.

“These transactions have no documents, but that’s the fact.”

Even the fees that the employers were supposed to pay the Malaysian government for recruiting workers came from the migrants, the broker said.

On the Bangladesh end, sub-agents had to pay Tk 1.8 lakh (RM 9,000) per worker to the syndicate members. Of that, Tk 1 lakh (RM 5,000) was sent to Amin in Malaysia via hundi.

Amin apparently shared the amount with the “powerful politicians” of Malaysia, industry insiders alleged.

Of the remaining Tk 80,000 (RM 4,000), the syndicate members took Tk 40,000 as commission and the rest was spent for processing the workers’ documents.

Certain political elements and officials in Bangladesh also received a portion of the bribes, they said.

Several layers of brokers and sub-agents in Bangladesh also collected an average of Tk 2.2 lakh per worker. Around Tk 100,000 of it was sent to Malaysia via hundi for the human resources managers of the employing companies, brokers and certain officials.

“That’s how the cost of recruitment under the G2G Plus went up to Tk 4 lakh,” an agent said, adding that it was an irony that the online systems aimed at avoiding middlemen, lowering recruitment cost and curbing exploitation fed the practice instead.

Bangladesh’s expatriates’ welfare minister Nurul Islam, however, only blamed Malaysia for the syndicate.

After repeated questions from journalists at a press conference on August 28, he said the ministry would issue show cause notices to the syndicate members and was “collecting data”.

Contacted on October 10, Dr Ahmed Munirus Salehin, additional secretary (employment) at the ministry, said, “No, we haven’t served any notice.” – The Statesman/Asia News Network

KUALA LUMPUR: The use of middlemen in the hiring of Nepalese foreign workers will be eliminated as all deals will be done through a government-to-government (G2G) initiative, says Human Resources Minister M. Kulasegaran.

He said the government had just concluded the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Nepal government to allow them to send workers, including domestic maids to Malaysia.

“We are doing away with all of the middlemen and instead will be using the G2G in our direct recruitment exercise,” he told a press conference at the Parliament lobby on Tuesday (Oct 30).

The Star in an exclusive report in July said that the government of Nepal had barred its workers from coming to Malaysia.

The move comes as the Nepalese government expressed its unhappiness with restrictive immigration requirements its workers faced before they could be gainfully employed in Malaysia.

It includes having to go through a private company for a security and medical check-ups as part of the visa requirement.

It is learnt that there are currently more than 500,000 Nepalese workers in Malaysia.

About 150,000 of them are hired as security guards, while the rest are involved in construction and manufacturing.

Kulasegaran said that a team from his ministry was on the way to Bangladesh to discuss matters in relation to the MoU which will be signed with the country.

“The Nepal MoU has been concluded and they will be able to send their workers immediately.

“For the other countries including Bangladesh, Indonesia and India, we are still negotiating,” he said.

Bangladesh and Malaysia yesterday decided to allow all licensed recruiting agencies of Bangladesh to send workers to the Southeast Asian country, following allegations of a syndicate of 10 agents monopolising labour recruitment since early 2017.

The decision came in a meeting between Bangladesh Expatriates’ Welfare Minister Nurul Islam and Malaysia’s Human Resources Minister M Kulasegaran in Putrajaya, the administrative capital of Malaysia.

“In the meeting, some important and epoch-making decisions were taken. One of those is recruitment of Bangladeshi workers in Malaysia through all Bangladeshi legal recruiting agencies under the G-to-G Plus system,” says a statement issued by the Ministry of Expatriates’ Welfare and Overseas Employment.

The new Malaysian government had cancelled the previous online recruitment system, SPPA, with effect from September 1 following reports of the collusion between members of the syndicate.

On June 22, The Star, a Malaysian newspaper, reported that an organised syndicate of 10 agents, led by a Bangladeshi businessman with alleged political links with the Malaysian home ministry, raked in at least two billion Malaysian ringgits (around Tk 4,000 crore) from 100,000 Bangladeshi workers in just two years.

onsidering that two lakh workers were recruited through the syndicate until suspension of the SPPA, the amount of money raked in would be Tk 8,000 crore.

On August 14, Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said that the syndicate had resulted in a monopolistic situation, with some charging as high as RM20,000 from each prospective worker.

He had then said that all the Bangladeshi agents would be allowed to recruit workers.

The recruiting agencies of Bangladesh and migrant rights activists have lauded yesterday’s decision.

“We appreciate the decision…,” said Nurul Amin, former joint secretary general of Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies (Baira).

However, the statement issued by the expatriates’ welfare ministry has made no mention of the recruitment cost, but Nurul Amin said it had approved a recruitment cost of Tk 1.6 lakh.

He could not exactly say why this amount would be required as documentation, medical tests, and one way airfare to Malaysia were not more than Tk 40,000.

“The minister [Nurul Islam] has approved this amount,” Nurul Amin said, stressing that this cost must be strongly maintained and any agency charging higher than the amount should face cancellation of their licence.

Mohammad Harun Al Rashid, a Bangladeshi migrant rights activist living in Malaysia, said allowing all agencies to recruit labour was a good decision, but it was extremely important that no parties were involved in corruption that led to labour exploitation.

“Corruption and monopoly in the labour recruitment process in the past caused massive problem. Malaysia had frozen labour recruitment from Bangladesh repeatedly,” Rashid told this correspondent over phone yesterday.

He said the reported allegations of massive corruption by the syndicate of 10 agents, with the connivance of the previous Malaysian government, in recruitment of Bangladeshi workers must be investigated. Those involved must face legal action, he added.

Meanwhile, the expatriates’ welfare ministry, in a statement, said Malaysia was positive about regularisation of the undocumented Bangladeshi workers now facing troubles in Malaysia.

Of some one million Bangladeshi workers in Malaysia, around five lakh are reportedly undocumented. Almost all of the undocumented ones had applied to the Malaysian immigration department for work permits under a rehiring programme, which ended on June 30, said an official of the Bangladesh high commission in Kuala Lumpur.

However, most of them have not gotten the work permit yet, he added.

Besides, thousands of foreign workers, including Bangladeshis, had remained detained since July 1.

Rashid said there were a lot of irregularities in the rehiring programme, where migrants paid hefty sums but could not get the work permits issued. He suggested that the new Malaysian government provide a fresh chance for the undocumented migrants to get work permits.

An 11-member Bangladesh delegation led by Shahidul Islam, Bangladesh High Commissioner to Malaysia, also held the first meeting of a joint working group with their Malaysian counterpart in Putrajaya yesterday.

Officials of Bangladesh and Malaysia would meet in Kuala Lumpur on September 25 to work out a new method of recruitment of workers.
Acting secretary of Expatriates Welfare and Overseas Employment Ministry Ahmed Munirus Saleheen would lead the Bangladesh team at the talks.
The Bangladesh team would include officials from the Prime Minister’s Office and the ministries of home as well as law and parliamentary affairs.
EWOE ministry officials told New Age that the two sides were expected to work out a new recruitment system to eliminate all sorts of malpractices.
Quoting Malaysian Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, KL daily, The Star reported that Malaysian government wanted establish a single and non-discriminatory system of hiring expatriate workers.
From September 1, Malaysian government stopped hiring workers from Bangladesh under the so called government to government plus better known as G2G Plus.
Since 2015, about two lakh Bangladeshi workers went to Malaysia under the G2G Plus system that gave monopoly rights to 10 Bangladeshi agencies to hire workers.
over seven lakh Bangladeshi workers are currently working in Malaysia, according to EWOE officials.

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KUALA LUMPUR: Beginning Jan 1, 2018, employers will be responsible for paying the levy for their foreign workers.

Announcing this today, the Human Resources Ministry, in a statement, said with the implementation of this new policy, all employers must bear the cost of levy payments for new foreign workers as well as foreign workers who have renewed their Temporary Employment Visit Pass (PLKS).

This also applies to employers who have already forwarded their levy payments before the policy comes into force, even if the PLKS period is still active from 2017 and expires in 2018.

“The levy payment requirement is already stipulated in the Employers Undertaking document which is signed by employers before they are permitted to hire foreign workers.

“Strict measures will be taken against employers who fail to comply with the law, regulations and policies in place with regards to the levy payment of foreign workers,” said the ministry.

The ministry said the levy rates for foreign workers, issued by the Immigration Department in Peninsular Malaysia for the manufacturing, construction and services sectors are fixed at a rate of RM1,850 while the agriculture and farming sector is RM640.

The levy for a household’s first foreign maid is fixed at RM410, the second (RM590), while the third, fourth and subsequent ones are at RM590.

As for Sabah and Sarawak, the levy for the manufacturing sector is set at RM1,010, services (RM1,490), services (RM1,490), agriculture and farming (RM410).

As for household maids, the levy for the first maid is fixed at RM410, second (RM590), third, fourth and subsequent ones at RM590.

The policy, which will be enforced under the Employer’s Mandatory Commitment, was approved by the Cabinet on March 25, 2016 and was initially scheduled to come into force on Jan 1, 2017.

However, after discussions with employers’ organisations and taking into account business costs, the industry’s adjustment period and human resources management of companies involved, the government decided to postpone it to next year.

The ministry said this policy is an initiative to improve the foreign workers management system in Malaysia, which has been outlined in the 11th Malaysia Plan.

Other initiatives include limiting the employment of foreign workers at 15 per cent for the country’s total employment rate by 2020, and regulating the entry of low-skilled foreign workers through the improvement of the foreign workers levy system.

The employers’ organisations involved include the Malaysian Employers Federation, Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers, The National Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia, SME Association of Malaysia, Japanese Chamber of Trade and Industry Malaysia, Associated Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia, Malaysian Associated Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Master Builders Association Malaysia and Malaysian Rubber Products Manufacturers Association.

https://www.nst.com.my/news/nation/2017/12/316614/employers-pay-levy-foreign-workers-jan-1-2018