Large scale plan to legalise illegals

Hishammuddin confirms a comprehensive amnesty programme that will be ready by the end of the month

KUALA LUMPUR: Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein has confirmed that the government would embark on a comprehensive programme to legalise illegal immigrants in the country.

He said the system required to identify and process the illegals would be functional by the end of the month and the programme, codenamed 6P, would span three weeks. The six Ps refer to the Malay words for “registration, legalisation, amnesty, supervision, enforcement, deportation”.

The estimated number of illegal immigrants in Malaysia is two million, but Hishammuddin said the programme would also involve legal immigrants.

“As a package, what we hope to do is identify illegals and those who are legal but also from abroad.”

Speaking at the launch of the Dang Wangi district police headquarters here, he said the purpose of the programme was not to give citizenship to the immigrants but to ensure that their skills were “channeled in the right directions” and that they were not “abused by human traffickers”.

He said the programme would use a biometric system to identify the immigrants and the registration process would include decisions on whether an immigrant was needed by industry and how long he should stay.

The Star today quoted a Home Ministry official as saying that illegal immigrants would have three weeks to take up the amnesty offer or face the consequences if caught without work permits or passports.