Take tougher stand against forced labour, minister told

 

Eight Malaysian companies, including those involved in palm oil and glove manufacturing, are on a list of firms whose products are banned from entering the US due to ‘reasonable evidence’ of forced labour practices.

PETALING JAYA: A rights activist has urged plantation industries and commodities minister Zuraida Kamaruddin to take a firmer stand against forced labour than is apparent from her recent statement on the issue.

“We have to regard this as a priority right now as so many companies have been in the news for being on the ban list of the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agency,” said New Su Shern, the executive director of Project Liber8, an NGO that promotes migrant rights.

New told FMT she believed NGOs would welcome any discussion on the matter. “We’re not here to bash the government. We want to work together to find solutions,” she said.

Eight Malaysian companies have been put on a list of firms whose products are banned from entering the US due to “reasonable evidence” of forced labour practices. This figure is topped by only China, which has 44 companies on the CBP’s withhold release orders (WRO) list.

Speaking at a rubber industry event last Monday, Zuraida denied that Malaysia had failed to address the issue of forced labour.

New, noting Zuraida’s suggestion that Malaysia reduce its dependence on migrant labour by introducing high-level automation in labour intensive industries, said the minister was “not providing solutions” to current problems on the ground.

She said Zuraida was not helping to move discussions on laws and policies that could be used to address forced labour.

Zuraida spoke of the Foreign Workers Centralised Management System (FWCMS), Malaysia’s online application for managing recruitments, saying Malaysia would inform the World Trade Organization that the country had upgraded the system and that it was now foolproof.

Asked to comment on this, international migrant worker rights specialist Andy Hall described the FWCMS as “bloated and corrupt”. He referred to several “unnecessary and syndicated measures” such as security checks and health screenings.

“To say the system is foolproof, as the minister did, is simply delusional,” he said.

“This minister seems, in my personal opinion, utterly clueless and completely out of touch with the reality of what’s happening on the ground and behind closed doors in the murky corridors of power in Malaysia.” - FMT