Asian leaders shamed by Malaysia’s “dirty, dangerous and difficult” jobs claim

The deputy prime minister of Malaysia, who is also the nation’s Home Minister, recently publicly stated that the job opportunities available in Malaysia are “dirty, dangerous and difficult” and are being offered to the millions of migrant workers coming to Malaysia.

Feb 26, 2016

Dear Editor,
The deputy prime minister of Malaysia, who is also the nation’s Home Minister, recently publicly stated that the job opportunities available in Malaysia are “dirty, dangerous and difficult” and are being offered to the millions of migrant workers coming to Malaysia.

Datuk Seri Zahid Hamidi made this assertion in the wake of public outcry here over the government’s announcement to bring in another 1.5 million migrant workers from Bangladesh.

Malaysia currently already has over two million foreign workers of legal status, and a much speculated “over six million” illegal migrants, taking up jobs in the manufacturing, construction, agriculture and other service sectors.

The statement that these “dirty, dangerous and difficult” job opportunities can only be taken up by foreign workers certainly shames the leaders and governments of these sending nations.

Today, Malaysia has workers from India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, Myanmar, Philippines, China and Bangladesh. Not only are they being sent to Malaysia to take on these “dirty, dangerous and difficult” jobs, there are also those who end up in the flesh trade.

This sitz-im-laben (setting in life) truly shames the leaders of all these Asian countries who, apparently, are being perceived as willingly allowing the sending of their citizens over to do “dirty, dangerous and difficult” jobs.

Is their leadership so devoid of ethical benchmarks that they remain blind and deaf to the fact that their own citizens must risk doing “dirty, dangerous and difficult” jobs in a foreign country?

And should they not question the Malaysian leaders as to why the government is shamelessly recruiting citizens of other, poorer countries to do such “dirty, dangerous and difficult” jobs? Why are these job opportunities not made clean, safe and humanly not too difficult by the recruiting country?

Or are there far too many gravy-train parasites involved in this chain of modern day slavery that the repatriation of hard currency at the expense of the safety, dignity and honour of their own citizens is all that matters for the leaders and governments of sending nations?

Hopefully, in the best interest of humanitarian values, human dignity and citizens’ honour, the leaders of all these sending nations are held accountable for this state of affairs. It should not be clouded by mere economic and financial equations.

Now that Malaysia has officially declared in the open that our jobs available to migrant workers are “dirty, dangerous and difficult”, will all these leaders continue to send their citizens here, or will they start to listen to the many sad stories brought back home by disillusioned, exploited and abused workers?

J. D. Lovrenciear
Kuala Lumpur

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