LETTER | Many may be left confused by the political mud-slinging taking over recently, but one thing seems clear – Human Resources Minister M Saravanan has come out a winner in public perception.

Bagan MP Lim Guan Eng (above) has repeatedly been accusing Saravanan of failing to resolve the country's labour shortage.

But in actual fact, the nation’s foreign workers system was crippled by Pakatan Harapan, especially DAP leaders, when they held federal powers, leading to the manpower shortages experienced today.  

Even before the Covid-19 pandemic, Harapan had imposed a moratorium on the intake of foreign workers from Bangladesh in 2019 and refused to renew the memorandum of understanding with other source countries.

As of now, as we are fully aware, employers have been advised to speed up on their end in the recruitment of foreign workers as there are still delays by employers even though approvals have been granted by the government. 

The matter was the responsibility of the employers as the government only played a role in resolving and giving permission to a quota of 400,000 to employers.

After getting the approval for the foreign worker quota from the Human Resources Ministry and paying the foreign worker levy at the Immigration Department, then only will the employers be able to decide on the origin of the workers they wish to hire.

The ministry does not decide the country the foreign workers are to be recruited from, as there are approximately 14 source countries. The ministry only approves and the decision is upon employers.

Lim's lack of understanding of the foreign workers quota application shows that he is confused and goes further to confuse others. 

Several days ago, Lim criticised Saravanan in failing to handle the labour shortage.

The ministry has been expediting foreign worker approvals through transparent and effective mechanisms.

The foreign workers’ quota given to employers is based on the employment sector which has been allowed to hire them.

The ministry does not entertain requests for a special quota for the recruitment of foreign workers based on supporting letters from any party.

Only applications that followed the prescribed online procedures would be entertained.

Saravanan recently said over-dependence on a small number of source countries is the cause for delays in the entry of foreign labour into the country.

The minister further added that Malaysian employers' overreliance on foreign labour from only a few source countries may not only lower the competitiveness of the labour market but also possibly cause shortages in labour supply in those few countries.

The other problem is that employers prefer to recruit only Indonesians and Bangladeshis because of issues of language, and religion.

As such, the recruitment of labour from within these two countries has started to dry up which causes a labour shortage in those countries as demand exceeds supply.

That is the reason why the ministry recommends employers to employ labour from other source countries.

The ministry had previously allowed the hiring of foreign workers for three industries - construction, manufacturing and service - from all 15 source countries to help alleviate the ongoing labour shortage crisis.

On Sept 21, the cabinet approved the recruitment of 10,000 Sri Lankan workers into Malaysia to get employers to hire more workers from other source countries.

Lim is harping on the issue of foreign labour shortages but the employers had not raised many grievances with the ministry.

The ministry’s role is to approve quotas for foreign workers and to look after their welfare when they enter the country, but anything in between does not fall under the minister’s jurisdiction.

The minister has set Oct 5 for Lim to provide evidence that the former had failed to address the country’s migrant labour shortage. 

This writer is a political analyst.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.