Should foreign labor workers stay clear of Malaysia?

It saddens me to see that we have some 100 Bangladesh labor workers currently on hunger strike over at the local Bangladesh High Commission office in Kuala Lumpur. MalaysiaKini has more on that story.

You know, folks. I once worked for a big public listed company in Ipoh. To cut costs and corners, my employer then employed hundreds of Nepalese labor workers. Suffice to say that they were badly treated as well. :-(

From time to time, the poor plight of our foreign labor workers caught the attention of the whole nation but unfortunately not all cases of mistreatment and abuse will get such attention. Many were swept under the carpet! :-(

A Nepalese labor worker who had years of experience working in countries such as China, Taiwan and Singapore once told me that Malaysian employers are just as bad as the Chinese employers over in China!

That’s not good at all. Surely our Malaysian employers are not that bad. There must be some good employers somewhere here in Malaysia. Please do not tell me that all of our Malaysian employers are worst than those Pharaohs that once ruled Egypt long time ago. What about the government then? Aren’t they supposed to take care of the livelihood of our foreign workers?

Maybe foreign labor workers should stay clear of Malaysia for the time being. Go to other countries with good history of labor relations such as Singapore and Brunei instead.

"We have seen the "dollars to democracy" theory fail over the past twenty years. The Chinese people may have more brands to choose from at the store, but they still risk arrest, torture and imprisonment because of their political beliefs or their faith. China continues to imprison political dissenters and labor activists, to repress religious freedom, to execute more of its citizens than any nation in the world, to violate the rights of women in its population control policy. ... In 1994, the Clinton administration de-linked human rights and trade. This fulfilled the basic desires of the Chinese communist government. Last month the State Department Human Rights Report admitted that the human rights situation in China is worsening. The administration intends to introduce a resolution at the Human Rights Commission in Geneva this year. But why not take a stand in Washington, DC, using our economic leverage? If foreign policy does not contain a moral basis, it is a typical appeasement policy. ... I am asking you – policymakers – to re-think United States' China policy that currently puts profit over principle, otherwise we will be traveling down a road to larger and more difficult problems. We should not give the Communist Party in China a blank check. ..."

Harry Wu
Testimony Before the U.S. Senate Committee of Commerce, Science and Transportation
April 11, 2000

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