Over 2 million register with Malaysia's immigration office (1 December 2011)
More
than 2.3 million foreign workers,
including hundreds of Indians, as
well as illegal immigrants have
registered under a new programme
that aims to create a database of
all workers and grant amnesty to
overstayers.
The registration by over 2.3
million foreigners came within 45
days, Immigration director-general
Alias Ahmad said today.
Malaysia relies heavily on foreign
labour in various fields like
construction, plantations, garden
maintenance, and restaurants.
However, it has also been plagued
by problems of hundreds of
thousands of these workers over
staying in the country illegally
after the expiry of their visas.
The government regularly organises
amnesty progammes to flush out
these workers, repatriating them
back without punishing them.
During the current amnesty round,
the authorities have created a
database taking help of biometric
scanning of both legal and illegal
workers.
Most of the workers are from
India, Indonesia, Myanmar,
Bangladesh and Pakistan. House
maids are from the Philippines,
Sri Lanka and Cambodia and a few
from India.
Alias said the registration
exercise was carried out over 24
hours but, even then, the
situation was challenging as it
was done during the fasting month
of Ramadan.
The amnesty programme comprises
six components of registration,
legalisation, amnesty, monitoring,
enforcement and deportation.
He said the recognition of the
airport immigration office at
Kuala Lumpur International Airport
was the best in the world.
"The accreditation was made
by Skytrax which is based in
Copenhagen, Denmark... Two hundred
international airports were
surveyed, involving 18.8 million
respondents," he said.
Another accomplishment was the
introduction on June 1 of the
National Foreigners Enforcement
and Registration System (NERS)
that is linked to the biometric
system and enforced in stages at
64 entry points in the country.
"With the biometric system,
the management and monitoring of
foreign nationals can be carried
out more efficiently, such as to
detect false documents and illegal
immigrants," he said.
He also said that NERS was the
best national security approach
against cross-border crime which
is the main threat in the era of
globalisation, state-owned news
agency Bernama said.
Malaysia lifts security law, student politics ban (24 November 2011)
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak repealed another security law Thursday, setting the stage for hundreds detained without trial to be freed or face criminal charges.
He also pledged to lift a student politics ban in line with promises to expand civil liberties ahead of polls widely expected to be called within months.
Najib has been scrapping or amending a range of decades-old laws criticised as oppressive and outdated in an attempt to win back voters, who dealt the government its worst election results ever three years ago.
Opposition leaders and activists claim the reform pledges are election ploys, which do not herald any real change.
"All our moves are the result of the government's respect for the people's aspirations and listening and responding to the pulse of the people," Najib told parliament in a rare televised address.
"It is not cheap rhetoric or false promises; it is one of taking a brave moral stand."
Najib said the government was withdrawing three emergency declarations, which allow for detention without trial and date back to racial riots in 1969, saying they were no longer relevant.
"The repeal will not affect the government's ability to prevent crime or any other matter that may threaten the security or the economy or public safety," he said, adding that the declarations would expire within six months, giving authorities until then to either charge or free those held.
Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein was quoted by the national news agency Bernama as saying that 36 detainees would be released soon but gave no further details.
A government spokesman said a total of 1,481 detainees were currently being held under the Emergency Ordinance.
Police say more than 700 people were detained in the first eight months of this year. A UN Human Rights Council report last year put the figure of those in detention at up to 6,000.
Activists have long lobbied for the law to be abolished, saying it is increasingly used to hold suspected petty criminals without due process. An opposition lawmaker was briefly detained under the law earlier this year.
Senior opposition lawmaker Lim Kit Siang dismissed Najib's latest announcements as "election motivated".
"Whether he is prepared to walk the talk is still to be tested," he told AFP. "This should all have been repealed three, four decades ago."
In his address, Najib also said he would amend a provision forbidding students from participating in politics, which critics say stifles academic freedom.
He said students above the age of 21 would be allowed to join political parties "to respect the rights of undergraduates".
He also defended a proposed new law, the Peaceful Assembly Bill.
Dozens of activists protested against the bill outside Parliament Thursday, saying it aims to curb the right to peaceful protest by banning street demonstrations.
Najib's coalition has ruled Malaysia since independence in 1957, often with an iron fist.
But yielding to increasing demands for greater civil liberties and trying to regain support, Najib has promised to break with the country's authoritarian past.
Nalini Elumalai, a representative of local human rights group Suaram, said Najib should provide further details for the legal changes.
"We question the sincerity of the government," she told AFP. "They have been so secretive all the while. We hope they won't come out with new bills... that are repressive."
Earlier this month, police detained 13 suspected militants on Borneo island under the Internal Security Act (ISA), which also allows detention without trial and Najib has pledged to repeal.
Critics say the fresh arrests under the security act undermined Najib's promise to do away with it. The government says the detentions were necessary to protect the country's security. AFP
