Sabah records highest

Undocumented migrants in Sabah expected to be many many more than what was recorded


A total of 530,625 undocumented immigrants have been registered throughout Peninsular Malaysia and Sabah from Aug 1 until yesterday, Home Ministry senior deputy secretary-general (Registration and Immigration) Alwi Ibrahim said.

He said in a statement yesterday that the amnesty programme (6P programme) was carried out in 206 Immigration offices in Peninsular Malaysia and Sabah, as well as at 1,934 registration counters handled by 336 management companies.



Sabah recorded the highest number of registration of undocumented migrants at 152,588, followed by Selangor (126,094), Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur (103,075), Johor (33,451), Penang (27,046), Perak (19,999), Pahang (18,390), Putrajaya (13,400), Negeri Sembilan (13,065), Kedah (12,703), Melaka (5,842), Kelantan (2,150), Terengganu(1,761), Perlis (962) and Labuan (99).

Alwi said the government gave a strong warning to all management companies not to give any misleading information to the undocumented migrants, employers or members of the public, particularly on the aspect of payment.

"There are companies reported to have imposed a package payment of more than RM35 on each illegal by telling that they were acting on the Home Ministry's instruction.

"They should stop doing this as the ministry has never changed its decision on the service payment for management companies which is RM35 for registration and RM300 for the legalisation process, but only to be paid if the illegals are selected for legalisation," he said.

To ensure there was no cheating, Alwi said Immigration officers and the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission would monitor the situation so that the companies concerned complied with the regulations and the law.

Gov't provides same services

He said the same services provided by the management companies were also handled by Immigration offices throughout the country.

"Therefore, there is no question of the Home Ministry imposing extra payment other than what has already been set," he said.

Alwi said complaints could be directed to the Home Ministry's operations room at 03-8886-8110/8112 with the necassary details for further action by the ministry.

In Kota Kinabalu, the Sabah main committee on the amnesty programme has agreed to extend the deadline for the registration process for another two from today until Wednesday.

However, state secretary Sukarti Wakiman in a statement said the extension would only involve four districts, namely Kota Kinabalu, Tawau, Sandakan and Lahad Datu.

He said this was because the registration centres in the four districts recorded more than 300 undocumented migrants a day compared to less than 100 in the other districts.

- Bernama