Online registration for BD job seekers to Malaysia will begin Jan 13

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FE Report
Online registration for Bangladeshi job seekers to Malaysia will begin from January 13 as government has received workers demand from the Kuala Lumpur authority.
Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment (EWOE) Minister Khandker Mosharraf Hossain Monday announced this at a press conference at the city's Probashi Kallyan Bhaban.
He said the online documentation activities will be held through union information service centres on different days across the country. There are 4,500 such service centres in the country.
The workers will be selected through an online lottery following the union parishad-wise quota made based on the population ratio after completion of the registrations, said the minister.
He, however, said there is no quota for parliament members to send workers in the labour receiving country.
"We have received a formal demand letter of 10,000 workers on last Sunday from our Malaysian counterpart for plantation sector,' the minster added.
He said the Southeast Asian nation has showed interest to recruit around 30,000 labourers from Bangladesh. "As part of the recruitment, the labour market is going to hire the mentioned number of workers at the first phase"
The EWOE Minster said the registration programme for the job seekers will be completed in nine days.
He said the ministry has also asked workers to enlist their names on division wise. Dhaka and Barisal division from January 13 to 15, Rajshahi, Rangpur and Sylhet divisions from January 14 to 16 and Chittagong and Khulna division from January 15 to 17.
"After completion of registration process, a computerised lottery will be held. For Dhaka and Barisal on January 16, Rajshahi, Rangpur and Sylhet on January 17 and Chittagong and Khulna on January 18," Mr Hossain said.
The candidates must be present while they will be registered where they will have to pay Tk 50 each as a service charge.
Only genuine 'villagers' aged between 18 and 45 years and experienced in cultivation would be entitled for the plantation job. However, there is no need for any certificates on the skills.
He said the district officers would monitor the registration system across the country.
Earlier, the ministry decided to register the job seekers from any where in the country. But it had a risk to exploit the job seekers by middlemen.
"To bring the registration activities under government monitoring system, we have changed the former decision to reduce the uneven works by the recruiting agents," said Mr Hossain.
The minister said they will make a fresh database of 35,000 job seekers at a time in this way to send required workers in different phases to Malaysia.
Bangladesh and Malaysia signed three MoUs on November 26 on the resumption of manpower recruitment and cooperation in preventing and combating transnational crimes between the two governments.
Malaysia will recruit Bangladeshis for five years in three phases - the first phase will be two years, the second two years and the third one year.
The migration cost will be Tk 40,000 each for the purposes of skill test, 10 days' pre-departure training, medical test, air fair, welfare fees and other related expenditures.
Each worker will get a minimum salary of Tk 25,000 (900 Malaysian ringgit) per month, free accommodation and meal.
Initially, Malaysia will hire labourers for its plantation sector, and after that for manufacturing, service, agriculture and construction sectors.
The minister suggested the job seekers not to deal with the middlemen and give money for the purpose of migration to Malaysia.
Earlier, some dishonest manpower agents sent a large number of workers to Malaysia with fake visas. Following the malpractice by recruiting agencies, Malaysia stopped hiring labourers from Bangladesh in 2009.
Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment Secretary Dr Zafar Ahmed Khan, Director General of Bureau of Manpower Employment and Training (BMET) Shamsun Nahar and other ministry officials were present in the press conference.