The Malaysian Community Care Foundation says Putrajaya must make it clear that it cannot accept more refugees, and turn those already in the country into an asset. (Bernama pic)
PETALING JAYA: An Islamic NGO has called for an initiative similar to the 2011 “6P” legalisation programme to be implemented for the Rohingya community in the wake of calls for the refugees to be deported.
The Malaysian Consultative Council of Islamic Organisations (Mapim) said such an initiative would make it easier to manage the community in general.
The 6P programme – comprising registration, legalisation, amnesty, supervision, enforcement, and deportation – would be a “practical way of doing things”, Mapim president Azmi Abdul Hamid said.
“I feel it’s time we revisit this programme. Once we can document 80% of them (Rohingya), it will be much easier to enlist them in our workforce and integrate them into our society.
“We need to manage them in a way that the Rohingya become an asset to us.”
He said, however, that Putrajaya must make it clear it cannot accept more refugees into the country.
Azmi also said calls to deport the Rohingya did not make sense as their country of origin, Myanmar, would reject them.
Such a call was recently made by Malaysian Community Care Foundation chairman Halim Ishak, who said Putrajaya should deport the Rohingya refugees following reports of a human trafficking cartel involving Malaysians and some Rohingya.
Halim also suggested that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Malaysia be closed, alleging that it did not play any role in refugee resettlement.
But Azmi said even if Halim felt that UNHCR was ineffective, calling for it to be shut down was “too simplistic of a solution” as Malaysia did not have the capacity to deal with refugees and undocumented migrants.
“All we know is rounding them up and placing them in detention centres. And such action only makes things worse,” he said.
He said calls for UNHCR in Malaysia to be shut down showed that people did not understand the history of the commission’s establishment in the country, which began when the Vietnamese boat people landed on the nation’s shores in 1979.
At that time, he said, Malaysia did not know how to handle refugees properly.
Access to education
Azmi said Rohingya children in the country must be given access to education, either at public schools or those set up by the community with the help of NGOs.
“After all, some of them were born here and we need to help them socialise with the local people,” he said.
He said if these children were not provided access to education, there was a risk of them becoming a “menace”.
Azmi also said Malaysia needed to be firm when dealing with syndicates trafficking people as it could impact the country’s ranking in the US State Department’s annual human trafficking report.
In 2023, Malaysia was placed on the Tier 2 Watch List, a slight improvement following two years on Tier 3 – the lowest tier – which puts the country at risk of possible export sanctions.
