Last year, Transport Minister Datuk Liow Tiong Lai became the most criticised Minister due to the Road Transport Department’s crackdown against vehicle’s number plates. It appears now that Home Minister Datuk Ahmad Zahid will soon become the most criticized Minister due to the unwise and unfair online foreign worker permit renewal implementation by the immigration department.
As a result of massive public criticisms against the online renewal process, the Home Ministry has via a statement yesterday defended the outsourcing move to MyEG and the RM 38 fee charged for the online application.
The Ministry said that the fees are needed to bear the operational costs and managemnet of services.
But the Ministry’s explanation is unsatisfactory as it has not answered the key questions raised by many employers, especially on the question why the additional online fee of RM 38 per application when employers are still required to fork out RM 125 processing fees under the existing fee structure for renewing foreign workers permit.
It is no wonder that many employers have publicly criticized the fee charged as unfair.
Home Minister Datuk Ahmad Zahid must therefore explain why the unfair move as well as to resolve the other following issues which have also been raised by many employers.
Firstly, in the past, employers could buy bank guaranteed insurance from any insurance company, but now they have to buy from MyEG, if not they will be slammed with higher processing fee of RM58 per application.
Is this a fair and reasonable move to employers and other insurance companies? Why such monopoly for MyEG?
Secondly, employers include farmers who are not It savvy. Allowing only online application will pose a burden to these employers.
Thirdly, the employers who want to renew their foreign workers’ permit are now asked to issue cheque to “MYEG” instead of “Ketua Pengrah Imigresen Malaysia” like in the past.
The workers’ levies paid by employers differ from industry to industry. The average rate of levy per worker is RM1, 755. Since there are about 2.1 million foreign workers in the country, annual levy collection can come up RM 4.4 billion.
Can Zahid explain how long it will take for MyEG to transfer the collection to the government and why should not employers issue cheques to Ketua Pengarah Immigresen?
Until and unless all complaints against and questions associated with online application of foreign worker application are satisfactorily resolved, Home Ministry must continue with the immigration manual counter application.