... With a proposal being studied to severely penalise companies bringing in foreign workers without providing them jobs, groups have called for a “deep clean and overhaul” of the recruitment processes.

They said with the matter now brought out in the open by Plantation and Commodities Minister Datuk Seri Johari Abdul Ghani, it is time for all parties to go the extra mile to resolve the labour exploitation issue at its root.North-South Initiative executive director and co-founder Adrian Pereira spoke of “a whole web of individuals”, including civil servants, profiteering from the vulnerability of migrant workers…

While he welcomed Johari’s proposal of heftier fines on employers or recruitment agencies guilty of such practices, he said this would only act as a deterrent.

Pereira suggested that the government place labour migration under the Prime Minister’s Department in the interim, saying it is evident that the Human Resources and Home ministries are not capable of handling the tasks well…

[Migrant workers’ rights group Our Journey director Sumitha Shaanthinni Kishna] …urged the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission … to probe the foreign workers quota requests which resulted in over 900,000 approvals last year…

National Association of Human Resources Malaysia…president Zarina Ismail said “invisible hands” could be eliminated if the government embarked on overall digitalisation of the recruitment processes…