Malaysia is one of Asia's biggest employers of foreign labour. But recently, cases of deaths, abuse and forced labour have come to light. What is going on? Who is protecting these migrant workers?
MARAN, Dec 24 (Bernama) — The government has not finalised the recruitment process for domestic maids from Indonesia and discussion on the matter with the Indonesian government is still on-going.
Human Resource Deputy Minister Datuk Ismail Abdul Mutalib said several aspects still needed to be studied before the process could be finalised to ensure that the maids supplied would meet the criteria and needs of Malaysian society.
“We want maids who are of quality, are healthy, fit, skilful and hardworking and with some education to be supplied to this country to avoid any undesirable incidents.
“This is because there have been a lot of negative reports on Indonesian domestic maids who created problems for their employers by abusing the latter’s children, stealing things and running away from their employers.”
Ismail said this after an aid-presentation ceremony and the honouring of 240 excellent students from Maran in the Penilaian Menengah Rendah (PMR) and Ujian Pencapaian Sekolah Rendah (UPSR), at Dewan Jubli Perak Sultan Haji Ahmad Shah, here, Tuesday.
In another development, he said the government needed about six million skilled workers by 2020 to meet the country’s employment market requirement.
He said currently, only 28 per cent or 3.6 million of the 13.2 million workers in the country were skilled ones, with about 1.4 million of them in the public sector.
In light of this, Ismail called on school leavers and youths to take up skills training offered by the government to meet the employment market demand and to reduce the country’s dependence on skilled foreign workers.
Source: Bernama
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