Sarawak plantations group slams immigration over foreign worker raids

The Sarawak Oil Palm Plantation Owners Association (Soppoa) today hit out at the immigration department over the raids conducted on foreign workers in plantations in the state as well as the revenue collected in the form of compounds and deposits by employers who participated in the government’s recalibration programme, describing these as tantamount to “additional taxes” on the industries involved.

Soppoa’s Felix Moh Mee Ho said many foreign workers had been left stranded in the country following the movement control order implemented in March 2020 and the closure of Malaysia’s borders.

Given the subsequent halting of front desk governmental services, including by the immigration department, he said many foreign workers whose permits were expiring had been unable to get these renewed.

“There were thousands of valid workers who became victims of circumstance just because they could not be renewed as the immigration department was not in operation,” he added.

Moh said this had caused an increase in the number of undocumented migrant workers, whose data was gathered by the authorities through the applications by employers who had wished to participate in the recalibration programme.

“Instead of hoping to be rehired, thousands of illegal workers ended up being deported or arrested for not having sufficient documents to support their legalisation processes,” he said.

And with the data gathered, he added, the immigration department was able to carry out its raids accurately and efficiently.

As of January this year, Moh said, the immigration department reportedly managed to bag RM100 million in compounds and another RM200 million in deposit payments from employers.

“The total amount generated is nearly half of the revenue received by federal government from the windfall profit levy from palm oil industry in the same year,” he said.

“By looking at the revenue generated through compounding and deposit payments by the immigration department from a basic accounting standpoint, the RM100 million and RM200 million generated in fact was ‘additional taxes’ on the industries on top of the usual corporate tax or levy which are already committed.

“In other words, by generating such revenue by that department, it actually introduced further burdens on business communities by increasing the cost of operation, not to mention additional businesses losses caused by an insufficient workforce.”

Adding that the main role of government departments was to facilitate stakeholders to improve business operations and livelihoods, he said it was not to “flex their enforcement powers at these trying times”.

“Of late, there are indications that our country is heading towards recovery mode,” he said.

“While that’s good news, the main issue is whether that is really perceived and experienced by the general public and business communities who have suffered so much that an immediate recovery may not bring any improvement to their lives.”