Who benefits from renewed drive to recruit foreign labour?

 

From P Ramasamy

The recruitment of foreign unskilled workers has become a terrible addiction in the country.

About two years ago, the recruitment of foreign workers was stopped, mainly due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Given the acute demand for a cheap and docile labour force, the government has now decided to recruit foreign workers for some of the critical sectors such as plantation, services and manufacturing.

It might be true to some extent that Malaysians are not prepared to be involved in jobs considered dirty, dangerous and demanding.

The question is why Malaysians should work in these sectors under forced labour conditions.

It is unfortunate that the government talks about taking steps to end forced labour, but allows the inflow of cheap labour, perpetuating the conditions for forced labour.

Malaysia will never be able to address the problem of forced labour unless and until labour conditions improve in the country.

With the decision to recruit foreign labour, especially cheap and docile labour, it would be hypocrical to talk about ending forced labour.

In this respect, Malaysia must be prepared for the US and other countries to further ban goods from sectors allegedly employing “forced” foreign labour.

Even if the government wants to address the serious problem of labour shortage, there is nothing in the way that prevents the government from taking steps to reduce foreign labour in the country.

Maybe during the pandemic, hundreds of thousands of foreign workers might have returned to their respective countries.

Many of them might not come back at all.

But chances are that new workers might be recruited with the signing of memoranda of understanding (MoU), beginning with Bangladesh soon.

The pandemic provided an opportune chance for the country to finally take steps to reduce the burden of foreign labour.

With the new recruitment drive, that golden opportunity is going to be lost.

It is not that the move to recruit foreign labour is based on supply and demand.

Whether the demand is there, real or otherwise, remains to be seen.

But the real forces that are behind the recruitment are the numerous agencies in Malaysia and other countries that engage with one another to provide the flow of labour.

It is common knowledge that those responsible for the recruitment of foreign labour are high-ranking politicians in the government.

It is these politicians who set up recruitment agencies with the involvement of their relatives and friends to conjure an image of labour shortage. In other words, their aim is to create an artificial labour shortage with the ultimate aim of making hefty profits.

The government is not naive in agreeing to allow foreign labour recruitment on the basis of labour shortage.

Shortage of labour might even be an excuse to enable politicians and their cronies to make huge profits in the labour recruitment process.

The MoUs for labour recruitment are merely a government endorsement.

The actual recruitment, the ties between the recruitment agencies and agencies in the host countries, are invariably in the hands of the dodgy politicians and their cronies.

It is not that the human resources ministry or its minister M Saravanan does not understand the politics behind this recruitment drive.

Saravanan might appear to be a hard-working minister concerned with the labour shortage, but he is in no position to dictate terms to the Cabinet.

The big boys in Bersatu, Umno and PAS might be calling the shots in asking for foreign labour recruitment.

A lot of money is waiting to be made by bringing in foreign labour.

It is really nonsensical to talk about talent building in the country when there is a renewed emphasis on the need for cheap and docile foreign labour.

I wonder how such a labour force is going to create values in the production process.

Absolute exploitation will be the order of the day.

Creation of talents, so crucial for Malaysia to make the transition from a middle-income to a high-income economy, will be seriously impaired.

I thought that the pandemic created an opportunity to reduce foreign cheap labour in the country. How wrong I was.

In fact, the pandemic has functioned to allow more foreign labour into the country.

Thus, if Malaysia stagnates economically, who are we to blame? - FMT

P Ramasamy is a Penang deputy chief minister.

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.