Title: A study of employment issues and challenges of Pakistani migrants in Malaysia

Abstract

The influx of foreigners into Malaysia has occurred since before independence. At that time policies and legislation related to migration especially those involving foreign workers were less systematic. As of 2018, most of the registered foreign workers are among neighboring countries in the Southeast Asian and South Asian region such as Indonesia (713, 925), Bangladesh (544. 652), Nepal (346, 313), India (120, 978) and Pakistan (62,627) which ventures into various fields such as construction, plantation, agriculture, manufacturing and services. Although, the number of Pakistani workers is not as much as workers from other countries of the South Asian region, but the United Nation (UN) in 2017 has reported Pakistan is the second highest sending country of low-skilled workers to Southeast Asia especially to Malaysia. Therefore, this research was conducted to study the participation of Pakistani workers in the employment sector in Malaysia. In addition, it also aims to study the difficulties and challenges faced by Pakistani workers working in Malaysia. This research is a qualitative study, where data collection is carried out through by two methods, namely primary and secondary data. Primary data were obtained from interviews conducted with authorities and Pakistani workers. Meanwhile, secondary data were obtained from library surveys, annual reports and statistics related to the foreign workers especially from Pakistan. The result of the study found that in the aspect of work experience is divided into two perceptions, namely those who work in the professional and high skills category, and those who work in the semi -skilled and unskilled categories. Professionals consider the work environment to be good and very conducive while working in Malaysia. But on the other hand, those involved in 3D jobs argue that there is discriminatory treatment perpetrated by both employers and co -workers in the workplace. In addition, respondents also face language communication problems in the workplace and it has caused some employees to be less motivated while working. However, some respondents consider the language issue not a barrier and they can still interact as far as they can understand. Some of them also took initiative to learn the local language so that they can communicate with local workers. The latter is related to remittance, where the results show that not all workers are able to send money back to Pakistan because it depends on economic activity, salary earned and the attitude of saving money by the employee.