The government is trying to get the time of the Malaysian government’s rehiring programme extended so that around five lakh Bangladeshis living illegally (undocumented) in that country can get enforcement cards (E-card). The rehiring programme, which was launched on February 15, 2016 in Malaysia, is scheduled to end on December 31.

According to Bangladeshi embassy sources in Malaysia, the E-card would enable an undocumented Bangladeshi to legally stay and work in that country for two years from the day of getting the card. As many as 187,766 “undocumented Bangladeshis” have registered for the E-card so far, they added.

The secretary of the ministry of expatriates’ employment and overseas welfare, Nomita Halder, told The Independent: “Our ministry and our mission in Malaysia have requested the Malaysian authorities to extend the time of the ongoing rehiring programme.”

The secretary informed that the government had suggested to the Malaysian authorities to hold a meeting of the joint working group (JWG) on November 22, but they disagreed.

“Now we will offer them to hold the JWG meeting on December 4-7. If the meeting is held, we will urge our counterparts to extend the time of the rehiring programme,” she added. Sources in the expatriate ministry said that the Bangladeshi embassy in Malaysia was campaigning seriously in different provinces of Malaysia so that the undocumented expatriates could register under the rehiring programme to get the E-card. An applicant would require some documents such as air ticket, passport or other papers, a letter from the Bangladeshi embassy and the requisite fee to register for the rehiring programme.

To help the expatriates to get the E-card, the Bangladeshi embassy has allowed fresh enrolment for machine readable passports (MRP) after confirming their nationality by police verification through the Special Branch (SB).

As per data by the Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies (BAIRA), there are around one crore expatriate Bangladeshis working across the globe, with most of them in Middle East countries.

Of the expatriate Bangladeshis, 26 lakh work in Saudi Arabia, 23 lakh in UAE, 10 lakh in Malaysia, nine lakh in Oman, five lakh in Kuwait, five lakh in Singapore, three lakh in Qatar, and 5,000 in Italy.