Fixing Malaysia’s deadly addiction to cheap foreign labour

[superadmin]

As I drove through the industrial area in Senai, Johor, I saw droves of Bangladeshis walking along the side of a road, presumably en route to their factory floor. And on the other side of the same road, I saw a line of Indonesians streaming out of a blue “bas pekerja” (factory bus).

But such a sight is increasingly not just confined to industrial areas. Central Kuala Lumpur has looked less Malaysian and more foreign for a while now. And when I rode the iconic Penang ferry last year, it carried just as many foreign workers as it did Malaysians – a sight that starkly contrasted with my childhood days.

These remarks are not meant to be xenophobic in the least, merely an observation of a dangerous trend that’s arresting Malaysia’s development and keeping us locked in middle-income nation territory.


- More -