Malaysia is one of Asia's biggest employers of foreign labour. But recently, cases of deaths, abuse and forced labour have come to light. What is going on? Who is protecting these migrant workers?
Haikal Jalil
newsdesk@thesundaily.com
KUALA LUMPUR: More than 31,000 workers nationwide were laid off from January to September this year due to the economic downturn, Deputy Human Resources Minister Datuk Ismail Abd Muttalib told the Dewan Rakyat.
He said 54.2% of the total was retrenched through normal termination notices, while the rest through voluntary separation scheme.
Among the sectors hit worst by the retrenchment exercise were finance and insurance, with more than 17,000 workers affected, he added.
“This is followed by the manufacturing, transportation and real estate sectors. The government sympathises with the affected employees and has initiated various measures to assist them,” he said in reply to a question by Datin Mastura Mohd Yazid (BN-Kuala Kangsar) who asked the number of employees dismissed following the world economic recession.
In 2015, a total of 44,343 employees were dismissed from their services, he said, adding sometimes, terminating the services of workers could not be avoided.
As part of the efforts to rehire those who have lost their jobs, the government would hold job fairs in nine Urban Transformation Centre nationwide on Nov 5 in which 280 employers would take part with 15,000 positions to be filled.
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