Thursday 3 November 2011

6P Amnesty and legalisation processes to run simultaneously

PUTRAJAYA (Nov 1, 2011): The government has decided that the amnesty and legalisation processes under the ‘6P Programme’ for illegal immigrant workers be carried out simultaneously.
Home Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein said today this was so that illegal immigrants wishing to return to their country of origin, can leave the country as soon as possible.
The ‘6P programme’ which was launched on July 11 comprises six processes – ‘Pendaftaran’ (registration) , ‘Pemutihan’ (legalisation), ‘Pengampunan’ (amnesty), ‘Pemantauan’ (supervision), ‘Penguatkuasaan’ (enforcement) and ‘Pengusiran’ (deportation).
Hishammuddin said the amnesty process involves two categories of illegal immigrants – those who had participated in the registration process which ended on Aug 31 and wished to leave this country immediately, and those who had surrendered voluntarily.
“Under this process, illegal immigrants can deal directly with the Immigration Department to obtain an Exit Inspection Memo to leave the country without any action being taken against them,” he said in a statement.
As of Oct 31, a total of 25,561 illegal immigrants had been granted amnesty and had left the country under the 6P amnesty.
The majority of them were from Indonesia (15,901 immigrants), India (2,501), Nepal (1,048), Myanmar (1,040) and Vietnam (930).
“The illegal immigrants who were granted amnesty had been screened and found to be free of any criminal record and were therefore allowed to return home with all the costs fully borne by the immigrants themselves,” he said.
“So far, the government has not had to provide any allocations to finance their repatriation, including cost of food and temporary lodging,” Hishammuddin said.
Meanwhile, he said as of Sunday, 27,514 illegal immigrants had been legalised to work for 2,208 employers throughout the country under the 6P Programme.
Through the 6P Programme, the government had succeeded in saving about RM3.3 billion in terms of gross expenditure to register 1,303,126 illegal immigrants which ended on Aug 31.
At the same time, he said, the government also managed to increase collection from the fees charged for levy, pass and visa imposed on the foreign workers who were given amnesty.
The 6P programme was aimed at gathering biometric data on the large number of illegal immigrants in the country to enhance management and law enforcement of foreign workers on a large scale.
A total of 2,320,034 immigrants comprising 1,016,908 legal workers and 1,303,126 illegal workers were biometrically registered during the registration stage which ended on Aug 31.
Indonesians made up the highest number of foreign workers here with 640,609 illegal workers and 405,312 legal workers; followed by Bangladeshis, numbering 267,803 illegal workers and 132,897 legal; and Nepalese 221,617 legitimate workers and 33,437 illegals.

M'sia-Aussie deal failure cause of boat deaths, says Bowen

MELBOURNE (Nov 2, 2011): Australia’s Immigration Minister Chris Bowen said the drowning deaths of 27 asylum-seekers yesterday could be linked to the collapse of the Malaysia refugee swap deal.
He said the Malaysia deal was designed to do "exactly" that, "creating safer pathways, increasing the humanitarian intake", The Age newspaper quoted the minister as saying.
Bowen told ABC Radio today he had argued consistently that if the Malaysia deal was blocked, there would be more deaths at sea.
"I've never been more disappointed to be proven right. This is a terrible tragedy but it's a fact that when you've more boats coming to Australia, you'll see more deaths.
"We didn't adopt the Malaysia arrangement because it was politically easy or it was convenient, quite the opposite.
"We adopted it because we knew that this was the sort of arrangement that was necessary, to prevent more deaths at sea, and that's exactly what we've seen," he said.
However, he stopped short of openly blaming the opposition which has refused to pass legislation to overcome the court ban on the Malaysia swap deal in Parliament.
Bowen also said the arrival of another boat carrying 92 asylum seekers off Christmas Island yesterday, the sixth since the policy shift to onshore processing, showed there had been an "uptake of boat arrivals" since the Malaysia deal collapsed, which the government had also predicted.
Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said the government could have its legislation clear Parliament if it accepted opposition amendments.
But, he refused to blame government policy for the drowning deaths. "It's unhelpful to engage in that sort of rhetoric," he told ABC Radio, adding that criminal people smugglers were to blame.

Income tax officer collects double tax from old vehicles’ owners in Maungdaw

Maungdaw, Arakan State: The income tax officer is going to collect double tax from old vehicles’ owners in Maungdaw since October 31, said a vehicles’ owner.

“The new civilianized government had announced to hand over the old vehicles to the authority and will issue a permit to import a new vehicle but in Maungdaw and Buthidaung most of the owners of old vehicle are Rohingya community and not able to hand over the old vehicles in Akyab for restriction of movement.”

“The old vehicles’ owners from northern Arakan were sold their old vehicles to Rakhine community from Akyab who are working on this business.”

The Maungdaw income tax office issued a letter to all the old vehicles’ owners to meet the officer on October 31, where the Assistant income tax officer Sein Shin asked the owners to pay sell tax who sold their vehicles, said an officer from income tax office of Maungdaw.

“The sale tax was paid by Rakhine who bought the vehicles from Rohingya and paid tax in Akyab before they handed over the vehicles to authority to get a permit to import a new vehicle.”

“Usually the sale tax is paid by buyer not from seller.”

Now the Maungdaw income tax officer is asking again sale tax from Rohingya old vehicles’ owners which made the Rohingya community uneasy in their business, said an old businessman from Maungdaw.

“The old vehicles are very old which was used in the World War II and the Rohingya are keeping this kind of vehicles for transport in northern Arakan.”

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Maung daw, Arakan state, Myanmar (Burma)
I am an independent man who voted to humanitarian aid.