PETALING JAYA: The home ministry’s sudden change to its foreign worker policy has caught industry players by surprise, the Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM) said today.
FMM president Soh Thian Lai described the move giving employers until March 31 to obtain visas for migrant workers, or have their quotas cancelled, as “sudden and hasty”.
Employers also have until May 31 to bring these migrant workers into Malaysia under the unused quotas once the visas are granted.
Soh said this would leave manufacturers unable to meet manpower requirements, adding that some firms had planned their migrant worker intake in stages according to their project schedule.
He said the decision could lead to cancelled job orders or financial penalties for the late delivery of orders due to the manpower shortage.
“Many manufacturers with active quota balances had either delayed the process of bringing in the workers due to the softening of the market, or staggered the worker intake over the 18-month quota validity period to coincide with their peak production period.
“Allowing only one month for employers to get the calling visas issued would be a near impossible timeline as there is a long process involved.
“It starts with the job order approval at the source country, then the worker interviews and selection, passport issuance and medical check-ups before the employer can apply for the calling visas,” he said in a statement.
The FMM president expressed disappointment at how the policy change was decided without consulting stakeholders.
He added that the government’s focus on meeting the 12th Malaysia Plan’s targeted number of foreign workers by 2025 did not consider the industry’s need for workers.
“We appeal to the government to immediately convene a stakeholder engagement to understand the situation on the ground, and to reconsider the policy implementation by extending the timeline by six months until September 2024,” Soh said.
Last week, home minister Saifuddin Nasution Ismail reportedly said that active foreign worker quotas would be voided if calling visas, also known as visas with reference, were not issued by March 31.
He also said that from June 1, Putrajaya would not allow foreign workers into the country under these active quotas. Employers who paid the levy for scrapped quotas will be refunded.
