Staff Reporter :
About 270 Bangladeshi workers in Malaysia have been cheated by a local consultancy firm in Bandar Baru Bangi under Selangar Province, it was alleged.
“The company has collected over RM 2 million (Malaysian Ringgit) from about 270 Bangladeshi workers and also taken their passports in the name of helping them to get new jobs and registered them in rehiring programme,” said Alamgir Hossain, a Bangladeshi worker and one of the victims of the incident at a press conference in Kuala Lumpur on Sunday.
He said the company had assured them of getting new jobs and to get work permits through the rehiring programme.
Meanwhile, the victims have filed cases with the Kuala Lumpur police.
Alamgir said they have started dealing with that company from March last year. Though it is more than a year now, the company did nothing for them.
He also said the company had collected their passports and RM 8,000 per head for job and work permit.
The victims are now living with fear because they did not have any legal documents, even not their passports. He said the company had also refused to return their passports.
Another Bangladeshi worker Imran Hossain said, most of them had worked in Malaysia for more than five years. They had entered the country in legal ways with work permits.
But most of them changed their workplace illegally to get better wages. And they needed to get documents to be regular workers.
“That is why we had approached the company in Bandar Baru Bangi to help us to get jobs and renew our work permits,” Imaran said.
He expressed hope that the Malaysian authorities would intervene and help them.
The Malaysian Immigration Department had conducted Rehiring programme for last two years to legalize irregular foreign workers who had not work permits, that ended on June 30 this year.
More than one lakh Bangladeshi workers now staying in Malaysia without work permits are facing arrest drive. They may be sent back home any time.
