Dhaka gets formal request
Lifting a four-year ban, the Malaysian government has decided to recruit 10,000 male workers from Bangladesh for its plantation sector, Expatriates’ Welfare and Overseas Employment Minister Khandker Mosharraf Hossain said yesterday.
The ministry had received a formal request in this regard through the Kuala Lumpur High Commission office Sunday, the minister told a press briefing in the ministry’s conference room.
At first, the Malaysian government was looking to recruit 30,000 Bangladeshi workers for the plantation sector, but later they cut the number down to 10,000, said Mosharraf, adding that the country would continue to recruit more Bangladeshis depending on the demand in the sector.
The government will start registering the names of interested job seekers from January 13. The registration will need to be done online at 4,500 information and service centres at the union parishad offices across the country.
Initially, a database of 35,000 jobseekers would be prepared. From this list 10,000 would be selected through a lottery for this phase of recruitment in Malaysia. The selected persons would have to face some tests, including for health, before they received confirmation through mobile SMS, said the minister.
He said the migration cost, which includes airfare, health tests, training and others, would not be more than Tk 40,000 per person. The selected persons would have to deposit the money to government-fixed places.
-With The Daily Star input
