PUTRAJAYA, June 7 — Saying there is an oversupply of migrant workers in Malaysia, the Home Ministry plans to end all programmes to rehire them once the contract ends.
Home Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said his ministry’s aim now is to weed out migrant workers who have been “legalised” through unorthodox measures under the previous Barisan Nasional administration.
“While there is a need to employ them, there is a need to manage them too. Right now we are facing oversupply… more than needed, that’s the problem we need solve immediately.
“They have brought us enough social and economic problems. We have to look into this issue in a whole new context. No need rehiring, stop that,” he said in his speech during the monthly ministerial assembly before 300 staff here today.
Muhyiddin said the volume of foreign workers in some areas in the country has outnumbered Malaysians.
But he also said the ministry is aware that Malaysians have been reluctant to take on the dirty and dangerous jobs that have been performed by these migrant workers.
“We will give Malaysians the job opportunities first, though some say they don’t want to work without “air-con” or oil plantation jobs.
“So, we will study a mechanism on how to work around this problem,” he said.
Muhyiddin said he was shocked by the large number of Bangladeshis who had been brought into the country without visas following a recent operation by the Immigration Department to weed out illegals.
“The Indian Ocean is huge. They couldn’t have reached here one by one. They must have been brought by a plane in huge volumes,” he said.
The rehiring programme that will end on June 30 was a programme facilitated the Immigration Department since February 2016 in an effort to provide illegal foreign workers with valid work permits.
To date, 744,942 illegal foreign workers and 83,919 employers had registered with this programme.
The ministry is giving room till end of the month for all dealings with vendors who were appointed before this to sort out their problems and no extension will be granted.
Muhyiddin said that employers and foreign workers can deal directly with the Immigration Department for any matters after this.
Muhyiddin also said the department will start conducting large-scale operations to crack down on illegal foreign workers after June 30.
