KUCHING: Sarawak employers are still in the dark as they face manpower shortage, particularly for foreign workers, to keep their businesses running amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
As announced by Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas on Dec 23, 2020, the Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) had decided to allow the recruitment of foreign workers to Sarawak with effect from Jan 1, 2021.
However, employers have not been able to apply for permits to recruit foreign workers at the Immigration Department as the application system is still closed due to the pandemic.
One of the worst affected industries is the oil palm industry where, according to Sarawak Oil Palm Plantation Owners Association (Soppoa) chief executive officer Andrew Cheng, all big and small plantations statewide were short of about 35,000 workers.
While renewing permits for existing foreign workers was not much of a problem, recruiting new ones was impossible, no thanks to the worsening Covid-10 pandemic in the country, he said.
“We are still waiting eagerly for any news and standard operating procedures (SOP) to recruit foreign workers from Indonesia,” he told thesundaypost.
Despite Sarawak having immigration autonomy, he said, the ultimate say is still with the federal government.
With borders of both Malaysia and Indonesia closed to curb the spread of Covid-19, it is impossible to bring in foreign labourers into Sarawak, unless they are expatriates or highly skilled workers, Cheng added.
“As announced by SDMC before, Sarawak can recruit Indonesian workers starting Jan 1 this year. However till now the oil palm industry is still eagerly waiting.
“Every day we wait means we lose money because we are short of about 35,000 workers. All plantations affected, big and smallholders,” Cheng revealed.
Uggah, who is also SDMC chairman, on Dec 23 last year during a Covid-19 update press conference said the committee’s decision was in view of the number of positive Covid-19 cases in the state involving illegal immigrants.
“If you’ve noticed, in the last few weeks, a lot of the positive Covid-19 cases in Sarawak involved PATI (illegal immigrants).
“After taking into consideration, we decided to allow the recruitment of foreign workers to Sarawak and hope that, by doing so, the entry of illegal immigrants can be reduced and, as such, the source of positive Covid-19 cases will also go down,” he had said, explaining that if they enter the state legally, they would have to undergo proper Covid-19 screening and quarantine before they start working.
Meanwhile, the manufacturing sector is also not spared from the shortage of workers, as highlighted by Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM) Sarawak branch chairman Dato Sri Victor Hii.
While there were no issues in renewing permits of existing foreign workers, recruiting new ones was an issue, he said.
Even if it was possible to recruit foreign workers into the state, there are other hurdles to overcome.
“Even if we can get Indonesian workers in, the cost would be very high, more than RM4,000 per worker, because apart from their paperwork and transportation and so on, they still need to undergo Covid-19 testing and mandatory 14 days quarantine, all paid for by the employer. So imagine the cost of getting 100 Indonesian workers in,” said Hii.
Therefore, he suggested that the manufacturing sector should strive to embrace the new norm like adopting the Industrial Building Standards (IBS) method and various other high tech means.
He asked the government to reassess the SOP and not make it a one-size-fits-all.
He added that the government should engage with various associations of the different industries to fine tune the SOP.
While some manufacturing companies resort to hiring locals to fill in the gaps left by foreign workers, the worsening pandemic has also not been very conducive to that.
Some companies, he said, were facing such issues as some local workers having to undergo quarantine due to close contact with an active cluster or positive cases.
“Because we need to abide by the labour law, when they (local workers) are undergoing their 14-day quarantine, we still have to pay their salary.
“We have a statistic where since the start of the Movement Control Order (MCO) last year, productivity levels of local workers dropped as much as 30 per cent. During the first three months of the MCO, they were not working most of the time due to the SOP, and yet we still have to pay for their salary in full.
“This unproductivity becomes a habit that affects their performance even till now,” he said.
Sarawak Timber Association CEO Annie Ting is hoping that Putrajaya allows some leeway for Sarawak to be able to bring in foreign workers from Indonesia with strict adherence to the SOP, as the state desperately needs them.
“I understand that the state government has submitted a request to the federal government. Next week Feb 2 there will be a webinar between SDMC, STA, Immigration Department and other industries to discuss issues including this, and hope we can get a clearer picture of the situation,” she said.
Meanwhile, Sarawak Housing and Real Estate Development (Sheda) Kuching Branch chairman Datuk Sim Kiang Chiok is optimistic that the Sarawak government would be able to resolve this issue soon.
“There is still a shortage of manpower in the construction industry,” he conceded.
“But for those (foreign) workers with proper permits and already in the state, there should be no difficulties in renewing their work permit as long there are work for them to perform here,” he noted while saying the Sarawak government is sympathetic to the issue.
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