Govt seeks MVR 50,000 fine on employers for withholding expats’ pay

The government has submitted an amendment to the Employment Act, seeking a MVR 50,000 penalty on employers for neglecting and withholding salaries of expatriate workers.

The bill, sponsored by North Kulhudhuffushi Mohamed Dhaudh, was presented at the Parliament on Wednesday.

It seeks to revise employment policies for expatriate workers set under the Employment Act and improve law enforcement, in order to resolve the longstanding issue of illegal migrants.

The revisions include publicizing the information of employers who neglect expatriate workers, fining them by MVR 50,000 and suspending their permit to recruit expatriate workers.

According to the bill, the acts that will be deemed neglectful includes withholding salaries, having expatriate workers perform a job other than the one they were originally recruited for, denial of basic necessities, and forcing expatriates to commit illegal acts during the recruitment process.

The bill also seeks to empower the cabinet to set quotas for recruitment of labor from individual countries.

The law currently requires that the number of unskilled workers from each source country to be capped at 100,000.

According to the new amendment, the quotas for labor as well as the fields of work will be determined under the advisement of the cabinet, following an assessment on the affect on the country’s labor market.

As per the bill, the assessment should cover the challenges facing the labor market, the demand for foreign labor in key fields, the number of expatriate workers and illegal workers.