THE Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM) urged the Government to resolve all outstanding issues in the memorandum of understanding (MoU) with migrant workers’ source countries to speed up economic recovery.
“We hope migrant workers can start coming in soon. This will allow employers to get their applications approved by the Human Resources Ministry (MOHR) One-Stop-Centre the quickest.
“Employers are looking at bringing in migrant workers within three months. Hence, we hope the Governments can resolve their issues within two weeks,” its president Tan Sri Soh Thian Lai told FocusM.
Yesterday, Malaysiakini reported that ever since Malaysia and the Bangladeshi Governments signed the MoU four months ago to reopen the labour market, progress has stalled due to objections over the number of recruitment agencies permitted to send their workers here.
“As of now, it is as it was in January,” Bangladesh Expatriate Welfare and Overseas Employment Minister Imran Ahmed was reported as saying.
On whether Bangladesh had requested to hold a Joint Working Group meeting comprising officials from both Governments, he added: “We have asked for it. We have not received a response. Until we receive a response, we don’t know.”’
It was speculated that progress on the talks got dented due to several issues, which includes Bangladesh’s rejection of Malaysia’s request that only 25 Bangladesh Recruitment Agencies (BRAs) and 250 sub-agents be allowed to send their workers to Malaysia.
Touching on the matter, Soh said that despite migrant workers’ arrival freeze being lifted on Feb 15, it would take a couple of months before employees can start coming as they have to go through several application processes, which he hoped could be shortened as well.
With the delay in talks, he added, it would delay the process of migrant workers arriving to Malaysia even further.
“We are optimistic in the economic rejuvenation in the first half of this year, with many companies expecting an increase in both local and export sales.
“But the delay in migrant workers arriving will definitely have a significant impact on productivity as industries would face challenges in meeting their orders and sales.
“This is because employers will face difficulties in filling the shortages in the unskilled general worker category as locals are not keen on certain jobs and industries, especially in the 3D sectors (dangerous, dirty, difficult),” Soh mentioned.
The business leader stressed that industries desperately need to fill their labour shortages especially in the unskilled category with migrant workers as there has been a sharp drop in foreign workers in the sector compared to 2019.
This occurred as many migrant workers, whose permits and term of employment expired during the COVID-19 period, have since returned to their homeland and employers have not been able to replace them due to the intake freeze.
Well governed, transparent recruitment system vital
On whether the Government should liberalise the intake process than limiting the number of agents, Soh said that the primary concern now was for the MOHR to list the available agents properly.
“The recruitment system should not impose unnecessary cost burden on both employers and employees.
“More importantly, it must follow global best practices in worker recruitment process which would protect both migrant workers and employers’ rights,” he quipped.
Nevertheless, Soh said FMM would support any effort to set up an open, fair, transparent and credible system of recruitment of migrant workers as both the employees and employers should not be victimised by the system.
“With that said, if opening up the market will result in greater competition and provide both employers and employees a well governed system, then we will support it.
“Selection and appointment of agencies must be transparent especially in the source countries. Most importantly, there should be no monopoly either in source countries or receiving countries,” he concluded. – March 29, 2022
Main photo credit: Malaysiakini
