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PAC chairman Mas Ermieyati Samsudin yesterday said there was no contract between Putrajaya and Bestinet Sdn Bhd for the latter to run the Foreign Workers Centralised Management System (FWCMS) despite a letter of acceptance issued in January 2018 for its development.
She also said PAC had identified several other weaknesses in the system such as overlaps in its function, the wastage of public funds, and the unauthorised approval of employer applications which the police are investigating.
Charles Santiago, a vocal migrant rights advocate, said the “bizarre” breach of government regulations in the lack of a contract was all the more surprising considering that the Cabinet had recently agreed in principle to extend Bestinet’s services.
Noting various national security risks linked to migrant worker recruitment, Santiago repeated a call for the government to develop and run its own system to replace FWCMS.
“What is the basis of this extension when there has been no contract? This has to be clarified,” he said.
“Migrant worker management should not be privatised. It’s not clear why the government is not pursuing its own programme, and there needs to be an explanation for this.”
Bestinet’s previous six-year agreement with the home ministry to develop, supply, provide and maintain the FWCMS ended on May 31.
In August 2015, the then Barisan Nasional government approved the FWCMS’s development under the home ministry and the human resources ministry’s Integrated Foreign Workers Management (ePPAx) system.
Mas Ermieyati yesterday said that both systems were single-window concepts, which had led to the wastage of funds due to overlapping functions.
During PAC proceedings, officials from both ministries said migrant worker recruitment could be done without the FWCMS, either manually or through the ePPAx system, she said.
She said PAC had also found weaknesses in FWCMS’s ID management, with two user IDs not belonging to any human resources ministry official and 24 unauthorised users approving 24 employer applications. The police are probing the matter.
The Masjid Tanah MP called on the home ministry and the human resources ministry to work together to formulate a strategic plan for migrant worker management, stressing that there should be no more overlapping functions.
Independent migrant worker rights specialist Andy Hall welcomed PAC’s report, saying the lack of a transparent migrant worker management system had resulted in migrant workers being exposed to the risk of forced labour and debt bondage due to unethical recruitment practices.
“The FCWMS system must be put out of action once and for all,” he said. “It is clear that doing so is in the best interest of Malaysia’s security and economy.”
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