Malaysia's 'freeze hiring' policy no cause for worry – recruitment expert

MANILA, Philippines - Would Malaysians take the place of Filipinos and other migrant workers who are working as domestic helpers and janitors in Malaysia?

“Not likely," said recruitment consultant Manny Geslani in an interview with GMANews.TV.

According to Geslani, while the proposed freeze-hiring of migrant workers in Malaysia is meant to protect locals who might be retrenched in Singapore and other neighboring Asian countries, Malaysians themselves might not take jobs considered dirty, demeaning and dangerous.

"Malaysians lack the skills in low-end jobs such as hotel workers, cleaning jobs and domestic work," Geslani added.

Geslani also said that the ‘Malaylization’ of workers in the Southeast Asian country is fair but Filipino migrant workers have still very little to worry.

Philippine Ambassador to Malaysia Victoriano Lecaros told GMANews.TV in a phone interview on Tuesday that there is "nothing new" about the news on freeze-hiring.

Lecaros said the global economic crisis may have caused retrenchments among Malaysians but Filipinos have yet to feel the brunt of this.

Between 27, 000 to 30,000 Filipinos are in Malaysia, said Lecaros. Out of this number, half are household service workers, while the rest are professionals, musicians and married to locals.

“And even if they did get laid off we won’t be severely affected because Malaysia isn’t even a top destination country," he added.

Online news site Bernama.com quoted Malaysia’s Director-General of Labor Datuk Ismail Abdul Rahim on Monday saying that the proposed freeze hiring would be an option to assist thousands of jobless Malaysians.

According to the report, 2.1-million migrants are working in Malaysia while 2,000 to 3,000 Malaysians are being laid off every month.

The Bernama report said that of the 28,000 Malaysians registered as jobless last month; only 6,000 had been able to find jobs through the Labor Department’s assistance. - Mark Joseph Ubalde, GMANews.TV

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