Last Updated: 6:53pm, Oct 02, 2013

KUALA LUMPUR (Oct 2): The government has decided to cease the 6P amnesty programme, which called for employers to legalise illegal foreign workers and allow the workers to be deported back to their country without punishment.

However, the programme will be carried out for another three months, from Oct 21 this year to Jan 20 next year, before it ends.

The decision was made at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Foreign Workers and Illegal Immigrants, which was chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin in Parliament today.

Employers who alleged that they were deceived under the programme can refer their cases to the Home Ministry, the ministry said in a statement issued after the meeting.

"The main objective of the programme is to solve the applications from employers who were not able to legalise their illegal immigrant workers due to deception by agents or management companies, reduce the number of illegal immigrant labour, ensure the adherence of the law and control safety as well as peace," the ministry said.

The committee also agreed that coloured identification cards for foreign workers according to labour sectors be issued widely to all foreign workers in the near future.

The cards will have all the necessary information on the card holders which will be connected to the biometric data centre under the Immigration Department.

It was announced earlier his year that foreign workers in the construction industry will be issued identity cards containing all vital information on the workers to ease monitoring by government agencies.

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