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Employers or foreign workers who had made payments to secure a temporary Immigration Department Enforcement Card (E-card) should lodge a police report as they are likely to have been cheated.
This is because the process to secure an E-card is absolutely free, immigration department director-general Mustafar Ali told Malaysiakini.
"I would like to stress that no agent can be used to register for an E-card because workers and employers will be cheated," he said when contacted yesterday.
"Report to the police on any such cheating cases.
"The Immigration Department will always offer assistance," said Mustafar.
He said this when asked for a response to employers and migrant workers who claimed they had paid thousands of ringgit during the E-card registration period, from Feb 15 to June 30, to undisclosed third-parties claiming to be agents involved in the process.
Mustafar had announced in January that the E-card would function as a temporary verification to replace valid travel documents and applications could be made at all immigration offices in Peninsular Malaysia.
Commenting further, Mustafar said payments should only be made to private vendors authorised by the government for migrant workers who have been issued with an E-card.
"This (payment) is for the subsequent rehiring process," he added.
Among others, the payments include a compound, levy charges and other fees involved in issuing a new work permit.
The immigration department had launched a nationwide crackdown on undocumented migrant workers from the stroke of midnight on June 30.
At the time, Mustafar said only 155,680 undocumented migrants working for 26,957 employers had registered themselves for the opportunity to be legally rehired as to work in five sectors - construction, plantation, services, manufacturing, and agriculture.
The figure represents only 23 percent of the 600,000 cards targeted by the immigration department, he said.
Enforcement to go on
Mustafar, meanwhile, also confirmed that the department will not accede to a request by Indonesia for the June 30 deadline to be extended.
"Enforcement (against undocumented migrants) will go on.
"The Indonesian Embassy understands the duties and actions carried out by the immigration department and the Malaysian government," he stressed.
It is understood that the decision was relayed to a delegation from Jakarta led by Indonesia's Manpower Ministry secretary-general Sunarno, during a meeting at the immigration department headquarters in Putrajaya on Wednesday.
Aside from requests for an extension, Indonesia's Merdeka.com also quoted Sunarno's request for Malaysia to reconsider its decision to blacklist all undocumented migrants who have been deported for five years.
"Even if a blacklist was imposed to instill fear, the maximum limit should be only a year," he reportedly said, adding that Mustafar had promised to relay the request to the Malaysian government.
As of July 18, it was reported that 3,787 undocumented migrants have been arrested, 963 of whom are from Indonesia. -Mkini
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