Name: Kamarul Azim Muhaimi Bin Kamaruddaman

Student ID: 2015898554

The Politics of Temporary: Foreign Workers, their Rights and Employment in Malaysia
from Legal Perspective
For more than three decades Malaysias economic growth has been driven in part
by the skills, dedication and sweat of large numbers of migrant workers. The country
has become the temporary home for enormous numbers of legal documented migrants.
The United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights reports that
more than 232 million people now live outside their own countries. Malaysia is the
temporary home to between three and five million migrants and foreign nationals.
According to Home Minister, Dato Zahid Hamidi said 1.5 million workers from
Bangladesh will be brought to our country in stages over three years to fulfil the
demands of employers from various sectors such as low-income jobs in construction,
services, manufacturing and domestic labour. Generally, the workers are thought to be a
migrant from neighbouring and distant countries of origin especially from Indonesia,
Bangladesh, Nepal, Philippines and India. The eager entrepreneur overcomes his
manpower shortage problem at a reasonable cost and the foreign worker gets the
opportunity not only to be employed but also with an income to improve the lives of his
family, a dream come true. Unfortunately, their voices have been silent, their rights have
been deprived and their noble and workable skills have been exploited by Malaysian
employers. Every Malaysian seems to have an undesirable story to tell about migrant
that often portray as problematic communities. The partially true of infamous discourses
and negative perceptions about the politics of foreign workers has attributed by
exploitation and abuse of foreign workers, human rights violation and insufficient
legislation and unconstitutional acts at the level of authority and state.
There have been many reports pertaining the abuse and exploitation of migrant and
migrant workers, from beatings to harassment at individual level. Unsurprisingly, the
Malaysian perceptions about foreign workers or the temporary always exaggerating
certain aspects such as Bangladeshi are lazy and smelly, Africans are behaving very
uncivil, loud and rude, while skimpy Indonesian maids are trying to seduce their
employers and popular justification about increment of crime rates in Malaysia are all
related to this temporary community. What is often left out is the hidden stories and
experience from perspective of foreign worker, the actual voices that concern with the

everyday experiences of migrant which is what I refer as politics of the temporary.

According to United Nations Special Rapporteur on trafficking, Maria Grazia
Giammarinaro said that the temporary have been exploited in long hours of work,
unpaid remuneration and wages, insufficient laws and being abused sexually and
physically by employers. From tapestry of our legal journey, there are only two cases
that have been brought before the High Court and it would be nave for us to conclude
this rarity of misconduct of employers and exploitation that happened to the foreign
workers. To be clear with this statement, there are more than 300 complaints every years
submitted to several of authorities, non-governmental organizations and media including
Amnesty International, United Nations and The Human Rights Commission of Malaysia
(Suhakam). According to the Suhakam chairman, Tan Sri Hasmy Agam he
acknowledged that there should be a better explanation and improvement of laws
pertaining to exploitation towards foreign workers. This grievance and rupture scene can
be best illustrated in the case of Sampath Kumar Vellingiri & 78 Yang Lain v Chin Well
Fasteners & Co Sdn Bhd. There is much more mess exposed in the judgment of the
Chin Well case, which highlights the plight of about 80 workers from India. Each of
them had indebted himself by having to pay Rupees 100,000 (about RM8, 000) to the
employer's foreign agent in India to secure the employment in Malaysia. The foreign
agent led them to believe that they would earn a basic salary of RM600 per month and
with overtime would earn RM800 per month, a monthly wage of Rupees 10,000 being a
princely sum in India. This conspiracy between employer and foreign agent have put
them into payback grievances. The court held that the employer, the local middleman
and foreign agent had all conspired to defraud these innocent workers who had been
'cheated, degraded and denied food and basic amenities'. It is now, for us to understand
that the exploitation is a real deal and no longer a marginal phenomenon, yet, an issue
that ought to be settled sooner or later.
What is it like to live and work as a temporary migrant in the beautiful city of
Kuala Lumpur, the post-colonization setting of Melaka and hipster scene of Ipoh? The
answers would be great yet suffocating or from perspective of foreign workers, it can
be understand as a great suffocations. This likely due to their denied human rights,
undignified violation of open rights and maybe deal with something like nondiscrimination respect to the temporary. In accordance with Article 2 of Universal
Declaration of Human Rights stated that Everyone is entitled to all the rights and

freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race,
colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin,
property, birth or other status. However, very little is known or understood about their
daily life. Malaysia as the largest importer of labour in Asia, surprisingly, not give a
permission to the migrant workers to join trade union and the workers do not own any
institution to speak out their gruesome experiences and frustrations. That leads to the
question: what rights do the foreign workers have and the attendant question, which part
have the local employer violate? To answer to this question is not as hard to find the best
examples in our local scene as to show the rights of migrants since it is not a mere
practice in Malaysia. But it is can be seen from the fundamental legal principle which
binding the employer and the employee the Malaysia Contract Act 1950. In other hand,
it is a contractual rights of an offeror and offeree. As stated earlier, the two cases were
charged under breach of contract. Yet, the argument is that the temporary have very little
capacity to enforce their rights in the contract. The crucial problems are the language
barrier, the cost of lawyers, inability to remain in the country to fight the case or work as
the employer will openly invite the Immigration Department to cancel their work passes
by citing some criminal charge such as strike, assault, battery, et cetera. Furthermore, the
segregation of task and duties between regular caf barista and caf attendants, between
constructions labour worker and services, who seem to be predominantly foreign
worker. Thus, it is very visible and safe to say that this segregation and division amount
to workplace discrimination and also reinforces stereotype of foreign worker that only
suitable to work in 3D sector dirty, dangerous and difficult. Some of the temporary
have to face a refusal to let them see the company panel doctors even for the
employment injuries caused by non-provision of protective equipment. Sometimes,
these local officers would ask for money from the refugees and threaten to arrest them
if they refuse to pay the money. Some of them being locked out and stranded in a small
room to unsafe working conditions. So, it can be clearly seen that discriminatory labour
practices, including undignified violation of human maybe common things in Malaysia,
but that does not mean we should embrace those practices. In fact, it is an obligation for
us to live in respectful manner and to go all in before Article 8 of Federal Constitution
of Malaysia which provides that all persons are equal before the law and entitled to its
equal protection.

The laws that spell out the immigration policy are the Immigration Act 1959,
Immigration Regulations 1963 and Passports Act 1966. The Immigration Act 1959 is the
key legislation that controls aspects related to entry into or departure from the country,
provisions of visas for legal stay and work. The Immigration Department a component
of the Home Affairs Ministry, outlines the principles of the immigration policy and coordinates the implementation of the policy. The departments which are responsible in
enforcing the law are the Immigration Department, Customs and the Police Force. As
for this legal framework, we believe that it is only just mere interpretation of laws but
what really happened in Malaysia is far from suffice justice to them. The real issue is
does Malaysia have sufficient local laws to address issues surrounding any aspect that
related to the temporary community. Through a series of reflective notes, it is a good
thing to jump into conclusion Malaysia have one of good written laws pertaining to
migrants Yet, very weak enforcement and capacity to embark the legality of all of the
provisions and acts. In fact, there is limited legislative protection for domestic workers.
Legal protection for registered migrant workers include terms and conditions of
employment such as wages, hours, holidays, termination of contract of service, nondiscrimination, freedom of association and access to grievance and redress mechanism.
The number of complaints filed by migrant workers and cases pursued are negligible.
There are many cases but it is not reported because migrant workers fear repercussions
from the employers. In addition, the unlawful and unconstitutional acts at the level of
authority and state can be seen from in on the Fudex case to initiate action on behalf of
the foreign employees, the reaction from the authorities was 'why do you bother, they
are only foreigners'. Such crass lack of concern for the foreign employees as human
beings, and to the laws to be upheld rather than the status of the employee being focused
on by the authorities.
As the conclusion, there are my fellow Malaysians who do anything from exploiting
to denying the rights of other, for the sake of money. Simply because they are migrants,
their hopes and desires are labelled lower, not same in our level, immoral and
parasitical. If in countries such Qatar and other part of Middle East practised the Kafala
system which is slavery system, in Malaysia may not exist by name, but the policy and
practice are still trapped in most of Malaysians minds. A sad and difficult reality but
this is how Malaysias culture rupturing and raping the foreign workers. Between
reality and fantasy, we, Malaysian, under the contributory negligence has managed to

put a moment of pain, trauma, tragedy and loss toward human beings that we called
the politics of temporary.