Recruitment in Malaysia: ‘Inform the people, be transparent’

Bangladesh and Malaysia must release details of the memorandum of understanding (MoU) they signed on December 19, 2021 to recruit Bangladeshis in Malaysia, said Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) and Transparency International Malaysia (TIM) yesterday.

They issued a press release from Dhaka and Kuala Lumpur and called on respective governments to take preventive measures against all possible forms of corruption, including syndicate control in the recruitment process, to protect interests of Bangladeshi workers and Malaysian employers.

Citing recent media reports from both countries, TIB and TIM expressed deep concern that a section of Bangladeshi recruiting agencies are trying to manipulate the recruitment process with the (unscrupulous) efforts of their Malaysian partners, while the governments have failed to disclose the content and terms of the MoU.

The release mentioned that the confidentiality contradicted both governments' national and international commitments to control corruption and establish the right to information.

TIB Executive Director Iftekharuzzaman and TIM President Muhammad Mohan said, "The manipulation created by the confidentiality of the MoU content will not only violate the mandatory provisions of the open and fair competition process of agency selection, but also limit the scope for accountability and increase the migration costs of Bangladeshi migrant workers and recruitment costs of their Malaysian employers."

Referring to the ban on recruiting workers from Bangladesh in 2018 -- on allegations of corruption, including syndicate control -- they said, "We call on our respective governments to publish the MoU in detail to ensure public access to information and to take specific steps at the national levels of the two countries, so that the influential syndicate can not again take hostage the Bangladeshi migrant recruitment process in Malaysia."