NGOs Concerned about Malaysian Government’s New Proposal to Legalize Irregular Migrants

The Malaysian government has announced that it is considering an amnesty program legalize irregular migrant workers in an effort to make “Malaysia more attractive to investors by increasing the labour market.” Currently there are more than two million regular migrant workers mainly from Indonesia, India, Bangladesh, and Burma and it is estimated that is an additional 2 million irregular migrant workers. Migrant workers are the predominant work force in the construction, plantation, agriculture, and wood processing and furniture industries and domestic work.

Although the government maintains that the proposed amnesty program will better monitor migrant workers, improve national security, reduce human trafficking, and increase tax revenues, a number of non-government organizations have raised concerns as the program would put the onus on irregular migrant workers to pay heavy fees and taxes in order for them to be legalized to work. More importantly, they are critical of the government’s plans to “outsource” the amnesty process to private companies that may undoubtedly foster further exploitation of migrants by installing excessive charges.

The program which is also referred as 6P—Pendaftaran (registration), Pemutihan (legalisation), Pengampunan (amnesty), Pemantauan (supervision), Penguakuatsaan (enforcement) and Pengusiran (deportation)—-is to take place in a span of three weeks. The short-time frame also has warranted suspicion by migrant rights groups who believe that this is program, “could be just another large money-making scheme sanctioned by the government.”