Kamruzzaman Bablu :
Allegations of illegal visa trading have arisen against more than 1,100 Bangladeshi recruiting agencies, which are not approved by the Malaysian government, and have been destroying the manpower market in Malaysia for Bangladeshis. These unauthorized agencies are pocketing huge amounts of money by involving in illicit visa trading.
As a result, the migration charges for the migrants intending to get overseas employment in the South Asian country have been increasing indiscriminately.
In this situation, the intending migrants need to pay more than Tk 5 lakh to Tk 7 lakh per person against the migration fees and visa processing fees of only Tk 1.52 lakh and the air ticket prices.
It results in a huge amount of illegal business in the manpower market. The additional money, which is around Tk 2.50 lakh to Tk 4 lakh, is going to the pockets of unauthorized agencies in the name of visa trading. Most money is being laundered to different countries, according to the allegations of Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies (BAIRA) members.
The BAIRA members claimed that representatives or owners of those unauthorized agencies have been blaming the 101 Bangladesh Recruiting Agencies (BRA), which are approved by the Malaysian government under the Appendix B of the Memorandum of Understating (MoU) signed between the two countries, for charging additional and laundering huge amount of money from the country.
Representatives or owners of some BRAs, which had also worked with those approved agencies to send workers to Malaysia as associate agencies, are also raising voice against them ahead of the upcoming election of the BAIRA to get the support of the general voters, they claimed.
According to the Appendix B: Para: C-V of the MoU, the Government of Malaysia shall select BRA automatically through the online system from the list provided by the Government of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh.
The Para VI of the MoU stated, the Government of Malaysia shall ensure transparency and fairness of the online system for selection of BRA and distribution of quota.
The Para 6.1 of the resolution of the Joint Working Group Meeting of Malaysia and Bangladesh stated, Bangladesh side mentioned that the recruitment of workers from Bangladesh to Malaysia will be based on the MoU between these two countries on the employment of workers, according to Article C(v) and C(vi) of Appendix B of the MoU.
Following the provisions mentioned in the MoU and resolution of the Joint Working Group Meeting, the Malaysian government has selected the 101 Bangladesh recruiting agencies.
Responding to the demands of recruiting agencies, the Bangladesh government selected 735 recruiting agencies to assist the 101-agencies as associate agencies for collecting migrants and sending those to Malaysia. Out of 1,520 valid agencies, 836 agencies got the scope of playing a role in sending workers.
Through the authorized agencies a total of 476,500 Bangladeshi migrants have already travelled to the Malaysian manpower market during the period of 2022 to May 31 this year. Around 17,000 intending migrants, who have failed to go before May 31, may also fly soon through the valid agencies.
Those agencies have been getting demand letters and visas through the automatic system of FSMCS from the Malaysian employers following its visa allocation system. They do not need to pay anyone for receiving demand letters and visas.
But, a group of agencies comprising 694 of the rest of valid agencies, which are not approved by the Malaysian government, and around 400 illegal agencies have been doing illegal business of visa trading. They have been buying demand letters and visas from some employers, which do not have much capacity to employ foreign workers, spending more than Tk 1 lakh to 1.50 lakh for each.
According to the sources, Human Resource Development Center of Fakhrul Islam along with Tribeni International and Celebrity International was involved with illegal visa trading in the last two years from 2022 to May 31 this year and has earned crores of taka with the business of medical testing.
According to the BAIRA leaders, travelling with the demand letters and visas of the unauthorized agencies, most of the Bangladeshi migrants have been facing trouble in their workplaces even after paying additional migration fees to the recruiting agencies. Such incidents have been damaging the country’s image to the foreign employers.
When contacted, BAIRA Secretary General Ali Haider Chowdhury told this correspondent that the manpower migration system must be conducted with the agencies which have the authorization from the employer countries. Such unauthorized agencies must be prevented from illegal visa trading and pocketing additional money in the name of visa trading.