Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said the process, which is included in the comprehensive programme to resolve the issue on illegal immigrants or the 6P Programme, would be implemented through a registration exercise which included the recruitment of all illegal immigrants using the biometric system.
The programme aimed to gather data on illegal immigrants in the country such as their work place, their employers, salary and several other information which would hopefully help in reducing social issues and crime which were frequently linked to this group.
"We want the exercise to help the government in updating the record on foreign workers and at the same time reduce the number of such workers in the country," he said at a press conference at Parliament House today after chairing a special meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Foreign Workers and Illegal Immigrants.
The 6P Programme comprises an action plan involving illegal immigrants namely 'pendaftaran' (registration), 'pemutihan' (legalisation), 'pengampunan' (amnesty), 'pemantauan' (monitoring), 'penguatkuasaan' (enforcement) and 'pengusiran' (deportation).
The Deputy Prime Minister said the registration programme was open to all immigrants in the country including those who came illegally using the social visit pass.
"Legal action will not be taken against those who had come to the country illegally," he said.
Muhyiddin said in order to ensure the smooth implementation of the process, the government would appoint companies which were experienced in managing registration including meeting employers and registering foreign workers employed by these companies.
"For this purpose, we urge the employers to be actively involved (in taking out and registering their workers) because under this amnesty programme, no legal action will be taken against them.
"The government also seeks the cooperation of the state governments through the existing security committees nationwide as well as the village security committees to assist in this matter because they have better knowledge on the whereabouts of these illegal workers," he said.
Muhyiddin said the registration process was also aimed at identifying the manpower needs of certain industries and sectors in the country, and in this regard, the government has directed all ministries heading the plantation, manufacturing, construction, and the service sectors as well as sub-sectors under them, to gather the facts on the strength of manpower required so that their requirement could be met after the completion of the registration exercise.
However, he said, all the manpower requirement and job vacancies in all sectors under any ministry would be advertised to be filled by Malaysian nationals first and would only be offered to the immigrants if there were vacancies.
"That is an exercise which the government must undertake to inform Malaysians that there are job opportunities available and that they should be given preference over the foreign workers," he said.
Muhyiddin said all exercises under the 6P Programme would be completed by the end of the year.
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