KOTA KINABALU: The Sabah government has agreed to appoint deputy chief minister Jeffrey Kitingan as chairman of a newly formed special committee on undocumented foreign workers and foreign nationals in the state.
The committee has been tasked with collecting input from law enforcement agencies, industry players as well as political and community leaders on how best to address the issue of undocumented foreign workers and their dependents in Sabah.
“Both the Sabah and federal governments agree that undocumented migrants must be charged and deported immediately,” Kitingan said in a statement here today.
“We are currently inundated with such migrants who have taken up jobs that our citizens do not want.
“They have slipped under our radar. We have no idea who or where they are or what they are up to.
“If we are not informed of their activities, we are exposing our citizens to security threats as well as health hazards.”
One of the ways proposed by the federal government recently to monitor migrants in Sabah was to issue them identity cards.
The proposal was heavily criticised by those from both sides of the political divide as well as local leaders, including Joseph Pairin Kitingan, who is the Huguan Siou, or paramount leader of the Kadazan Dusun Murut community.
Yesterday, home minister Hamzah Zainudin defended the proposal, saying the identity cards would not give migrants citizenship or permanent resident status, but allow foreign nationals to work in Malaysia legally and their children to attend school.
Chief minister Hajiji Noor later said the document mentioned by Hamzah was actually a proposed “kad warga asing” (foreigner’s card) on which the Sabah government has yet to make a decision.
In his statement today, Kitingan said that as chairman, he would meet with heads of enforcement agencies, employers who hired foreign workers as well as political and community leaders to gather data before presenting a paper to the state Cabinet for further discussions.
“I have set a three-month deadline from today to present the Cabinet paper. I hope the outcome will be acceptable to everyone, especially Sabahans,” he said. - FMT
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.