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A tenfold increase in visa fees has prompted employment agencies to consider boycotting Malaysia, long a favoured destination of Myanmar migrant workers. The threat, which could be backed up by demonstrations, followed an announcement by the Malaysian embassy to raise visa application costs from US$6 to $57. The fees are to be paid to a local service provider, a Myanmar overseas employment agency called Diamond Palace, which will offer the “one-stop service” as of January 18, the statement said. The embassy said the extra charges were needed to improve visa technology and make the system faster and more secure. The Malaysian announcement has caused fury among employment agencies. U Ko Lay, owner of Shwe Mandalar May employment agency, said that under the new system agencies would have to pay $26 in system charges, $25 for a service charge, plus the $6 visa fee, for a total of $57. “These charges are not necessary. If they wanted better security, why not just introduce an online system like Singapore?” He added that the Ministry of Labour ruling that no migrant worker should be charged more than K150,000 for recruitment-related costs will have to be revised upward because of the increase in visa fees. U Ko Lay added that Myanmar was now Malaysia’s main supplier of migrant labour, following Kuala Lumpur’s decision no longer to accept workers from Nepal. “This is not the time to start charging us more,” he said. An estimated 1 million Myanmar migrants work in Malaysia, many of them undocumented and vulnerable to trafficking and forced labour. Since inter-communal violence broke out in Rakhine State in 2012, Myanmar Buddhists working in primarily Muslim Malaysia have also faced religious tensions. The Myanmar Overseas Employment Agencies Federation (MOEAF) said the new scheme had been introduced without consultation, either with MOEAF or the labour ministry. MOEAF chair U Min Hlaing said the federation had already written to Malaysia’s prime minister, Najib Razak, calling on him to drop the plan to raise charges. “We wrote last month, but have received no response,” he said on January 8, adding that the federation had also written to the Malaysian embassy and the Myanmar labour ministry about its concerns, and proposing that the visa fee be set at $12. “If they persist in this new scheme, we will suspend sending workers to Malaysia,” said U Min Hlaing. MOEAF says that unless it receives a satisfactory response by January 17, it will organise demonstrations in front of the Malaysian embassy. On January 10, the service provider Diamond Palace failed to attend a scheduled meeting with the labour ministry and MOEAF to discuss the new charges. Nor has Diamond Palace responded to repeated requests for comment from The Myanmar Times. U Myo Aung, director general of the labour ministry, said the ministry had received no advance notice of the steep rise in visa charges. “Now we will write to the Malaysian foreign ministry requesting that they reconsider this plan because of its harmful effects on workers,” he said, adding that the ministry had asked in the interim that Malaysia at least postpone implementation of the scheme until May, when the incoming government in Nay Pyi Taw could address the question. U Kyaw Shein, managing director of Shwe Thiri Chan Thar employment agency, said his company would not pay the $57 visa charge, and would therefore send no more workers to Malaysia unless it was revoked. “Our position is strong because without Myanmar workers, Malaysia would suffer a labour shortage,” he said.
Keywords
visa fees, employment agencies, Malaysia, local service provider, Myanmar, Diamond Palace, Singapore, Ministry of Labour, Kuala Lampur
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