by SHAFIQQUL ALIFF / pic BERNAMA

THE Malaysian Muslim Restaurant Owners Association (PRESMA) expected another 1,500 Mamak restaurants will be closed by the end of this year due to the lack of foreign workers and the difficulty of finding local workers in the country.

President Datuk Jawahar Ali Taib Khan said that this lack of foreign workers has caused 3,000 restaurant operators out of 12,000 members registered with PRESMA to be closed since the Covid-19 pandemic more than two years ago and it has become increasingly critical.

“The lack of workers has a major impact on the survival of the food service and restaurant industry since the ban on the entry of foreign workers was enforced.

“Since the pandemic, in my chain of restaurants alone, more than 250 restaurant workers have returned to India and have not been able to re-enter the country while the Mamak restaurant industry needs at least 30,000 more workers to fill vacancies across the country,” he said.

According to a report by Berita Harian on Feb 3, 2022, more than 2,000 Mamak restaurants have had to close their businesses since 2020 due to the lack of foreign workers.

Meanwhile, Muslim Consumers Association of Malaysia (PPIM) head activist Datuk Nadzim Johan said that the government needs to act immediately to save the industry and thousands of affected workers.

“PPIM also received complaints about the same effect from the security control and cleaning industries which were also affected.

“This issue has to be looked into because it involves many people. In addition, the issue of demands, the implementation of the minimum wage, all of that is taken into account,” he said.

Jawahar added that his association, PPIM and the Malaysian Indian Restaurant Employers Association, as well as Malaysian Muslim Wholesalers and Retailers Association urged the government to extend the period of hiring foreign workers to October 2022.

He also asked the government to refine each proposal of NGOs representing various affected industries before other policy amendments are introduced to help their members get foreign workers.

“The announcement by the government will have a big impact because the labour shortage in all sectors is still ongoing and has not been resolved where the situation of traders requires the services of foreign workers, especially in the endemic phase.

“Currently, only 30% of the association members received foreign worker approval while 70% of the applications are still in the system and some members just want to apply since there’s a lot of requirements to be filled,” he said.

The Ministry of Human Resources on Aug 5 announced the application for hiring foreign workers was temporarily stopped from Aug 15-31 to allow a review of the application procedure for foreign workers to be made.

The ministry stated that this follows the amendment to the Employment Act 1955 (Amendment 2022) which will come into effect from Sept 1 and will be notified soon.