KL may recruit 10,000 more workers soon

The Malaysian government may allow Bangladesh to send another 10,000 workers for plantation jobs soon, said Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment Minister Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain yesterday.
“Around 90,000 Bangladeshi workers may gradually have job opportunities in Malaysia in the plantation sector,” he told the audience at the closing ceremony of a 10-day training programme.
The training programme for 304 workers was held at the Korea-Bangladesh Technical Training Centre in the capital.
The minister hopes the government might send around five lakh workers to Malaysia in the next five years.
On December 30 last year, the Bangladesh government received a formal request from the country for 10,000 workers for plantation jobs.
The government then launched an online registration system last month to select the workers from across the country.
On completion of registration and medical check-up, the 10,000 workers were selected for the jobs.
They are now undergoing training at 13 technical training centres across the country.
Although the workers' migration cost was fixed at Tk 40,000 each, they now may have to pay an additional Tk 10,000 if the employers in Malaysia do not bear the levy, the minister said.
Contacted, Dr Nurul Islam, a director of the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training, told The Daily Star that the first flight might depart for Malaysia on March 27 with around 300 Bangladeshi workers.
The other flights will take place gradually, he said.
After a 4-year ban on the recruitment of Bangladeshi workers since 2009, the Malaysian government finally decided to recruit workers from Bangladesh under state arrangements in September last year.
Kuala Lumpur and Dhaka signed a Memorandum of Understanding in this regard on November 26.