|
KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian government is planning to send home up
to 500,000 foreign workers by 2009 in a bid to force employers here
to hire locals, according to a report Sunday.
The move follows a denial by the government
earlier this month that it had frozen the recruitment of workers
from India after reports quoted officials saying a ban was in place.
There are about 2.3 million foreign workers in
Malaysia, according to home ministry figures, with the vast majority
mainly employed in manu-facturing and agriculture as well as in
domestic work.
“We have been lax with the ruling to allow
employers to cut costs with cheaper foreign labor,” the Home
Ministry’s top civil servant Raja Azahar Raja Abdul Manap told the
Star daily.
“But now, they have to turn to locals and pay
a reasonable salary based on supply and demand,” he added.
Raja Azahar told the paper his ministry was
planning to have only 1.8 million foreign workers in the country by
next year with the number dropping further to 1.5 million by 2015.
He told the Star only foreign workers in the
construction, manufacturing and plantation industries would be
exempt from the plan.
The government will not approve work permits of
unskilled foreign workers in Malaysia for five years or more, it
reported, with skilled workers getting a maximum of 10 years.
New minimum requirements could also be
introduced for employers of foreign domestic help, it reported.
“We are looking into the possibility that only
those who earn more that 5,000 ringgit [$1,534] [compared to 3,000
ringgit presently] be allowed to employ foreign maids,” he said.
-- AFP
|
