Good news for migrant workers

With foreign remittances hitting the first low after 13 years of straight gains, the news of Malaysia opening up construction, manufacturing and services sectors for Bangladeshi workers comes as a huge relief. Presently, private recruiters are no longer in the picture when it comes to Bangladeshi workers working in Malaysia. Bangladesh signed a MoU back in 2012 whereby recruitment of our workers for the Malaysian market would be conducted on a state-to-state basis. That plan however hit a snag from the very outset, primarily due to the government's lack of expertise in handling such large numbers of migrant workers to a foreign market. This was reflected in our incapacity to send the projected minimum 10,000 workers to Malaysia and only 5,000 lucky workers landed jobs in 2013.
Having said that, one must be realistic about what the Malaysian offer entails. It is a huge boost for the country's flagging migrant workers' foreign work prospects. Despite claims by the Expatriate Welfare Ministry that all will be well; the facts speak of a scenario that is less than rosy. Going by what has been published in the press, the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training (BMET) had submitted 9,500 applications to Malaysian authorities over a 9-month period in 2013. 7,000 of those documents were sent back as errors had been found. This example merely reflects that there is much to be done in terms of picking up the bureaucratic efficiency on our side. We cannot afford to squander this opportunity because we did not do our homework right.