6,534 jobs lost in Malaysia since start of 2016, now is not the time to be choosy!

About 78% of jobs lost come from finance, insurance sectors

PETALING JAYA: A total of 6,534 workers from 114 companies have lost their jobs since the start of the year, with 5,118 or about 78% coming from the finance and insurance sectors.

The number, which is more than a sixth of the 38,499 workers retrenched last year, reflect the current economic downturn and challenging business climate.

The Labour Department, a unit under the Human Resources Ministry told theSun today it had received 115 retrenchment notifications from local employers since early this year until March 10.

It is a legal duty for employers to notify the department of every retrenchment activity.

The five top sectors involved in the exercise are manufacturing (22 notifications), mining and quarry (21 notifications), retail (13 notifications), construction (11 notifications), as well as finance and insurance (7 notifications) sectors.

In the manufacturing sector, about 437 workers were retrenched during the period, followed by 395 workers in the mining and quarry sector, 184 workers in retail sector and 155 workers in the construction sector.

The department added that it had received a total of 13 notifications from oil and gas sector (mining and quarry), which has affected 241 workers in total to date.

The department also revealed that professional and administration workers accounted the majority of workers affected, representing 72% or 4,720 of the total, while the remaining 28% or 1,814 were clerical workers and below.

Commenting on retrenchment laws and benefits, the department said although retrenchment is a managerial prerogative and there is no legal provision to prohibit any company from cutting their workforce, there are salient points within employment related regulations that sets conditions when an employer conducts a retrenchment exercise.

For instance, Section 60N of the Employment Act 1955 states that foreign workers should be the first to go in a staff reduction exercise.

Meanwhile, Regulation 6 states that employers are obligated to pay lay-off benefits based on the following conditions:

• » 10 days wages for each year of service, for those with one to two years of service:
• » 15 days wages for each year of service, for those with more than two years but less than five years service; and
• » 20 days of wages for each year of service, for those with more than five years of service.

Employees not covered by the Employment Act 1955 may seek redress for possible remedy under the Industrial Relations Act 1967 if they are not paid any lay-off benefits.

The Labour department said the government facilitates retrenched workers who are seeking employment through an online portal services JobsMalaysia and its nationwide network of JobsMalaysia centres, which operate under the purview of the unit.

"In addition, the department through JobsMalaysia also conducts regular job/employment carnivals that aim to promote potential job vacancies for Malaysians including those affected through recent retrenchments," it added.

Wan Ilaika Mohd Zakaria sunbiz@thesundaily.com

Now is not the time to be choosy

Times are tough, jobs are hard to come by and more and more are flooding the job market as companies fold and lay off staff. For Malaysians, it's times to wake up and realize this means hard, even dirty, work.

What we need now iss the creation of jobs - a shot in the arm for the economy - and for Malaysians to understand that they have to get down and dirty before they can make a success of life.

THE old woman roams the back streets off Old Klang Road. With her slightly hunched body, and a smile on her face, she rummages through the dustbins in the alleys, digging into the bins with her stick.

She does dirty work, but she stays clean. She uses the sharp end of the stick to pick up the aluminium cans and plastic bottles. Her hands are only for cardboard and pieces of clean paper.

We call her Latha, for want of a name. She’s a Malaysian Chinese, from Klang.

Unlike some people’s stereotyped Chinese, she works hard, she puts in long hours and she makes just enough money to be comfor­table – by her standards. Thus, the smile on her wrinkled face.

But not all can do that.

The story of S. Sellamah is one such. She was desperate to feed her child. And she stole a 2kg packet of Milo. She was caught, fined and jailed. Now, she is on record as an ex-convict and lawyers are trying to get that jail sentence expunged. It doesn’t seem right that someone who stole so little out of desperation should have to live life with a record like that hanging over her head.

After all, I believe the guys in Milo would be happy to give her a carton of the stuff. They are people with big hearts. I know.

Over in Penang, a man also stole fruits and drinks, again to feed his children. His wife was in a coma and he had no money. He was caught, too.

But his story is one that warms the heart. The general manager of the hypermarket took pity on him, checked out his story and offered him a job instead. Now, the man has a job and his children can have decent meals. Isn’t that a wonderful ending to a sad story?

We are living in times of hardship. Prices are soaring. Jobs are getting scarce. Those with jobs are just happy to hang on to them. Companies are folding.

So many people have lost their jobs. Many are not even getting compensation for the jobs they lost. One media company actually told retrenched employees to go to court to get their compensation.

According to a report, more than 6,500 people have been let go from their jobs just this year. That’s only the tip of the iceberg. Even Petronas is letting go of 1,000 employees.

And we are barely three months into 2016. Things are likely to get worse, far worse, be­fore they get any better. So, it would do to have a heart and spare a thought for the jobless.

Yes, there are thieves who would steal at the first chance – which is why many supermarkets lock up items like Milo tins – but if the cases are genuine, surely having a heart for the poor can’t be a bad thing.

Talking of the jobless, a bunch of schoolmates from Penang are now embarking on a plan to help them. They are setting up a portal for odd jobs. They call it dojob. The idea behind it is that people need cash in hand for immediate spending.

No CVs, no interviews. You need a waiter for the party you are having? You may be able to find someone there. A gardener to cut the overgrown grass? Someone with basic know­ledge of plumbing to fix a leaky pipe? Stuff like that.

I think it’s a great idea. And what’s more. It’s free. It’s just a platform to get a hirer and hiree to meet up.

Of course, there are questions to be answered – like how would people without jobs be able to access the internet to look for these jobs? But that’s for those guys to figure out.

But the aim is noble. It could help people like the two desperate shoplifters to find some quick cash and tide things over until a proper job comes along.

With Malaysians now des­­perately in need of jobs, it’s a good thing that the 1.5 million Bangladeshi worker deal is off. To have foreigners take away the few jobs will only make things worse, not to mention the almost RM30bil that’s sent back to their homes.

What we need now is the creation of jobs – a shot in the arm for the economy – and for Malaysians to understand that they have to get down and dirty before they can make a success of life. For most of us, our forefathers did just that.

There are many Bangladeshis who are now running their own motor repair shops and car washes. They started as lowly-paid wor­kers and now are employers to Malaysians! It’s time for Malaysians to wake up. Times are hard – and that calls for hard work.

By Dorairaj Nadason The Star

The writer, who can be reached at raj@the star.com.my knows all about hard work. When The Star was shut down in 1987, he had to be a carpenter’s assistant, lugging lumber up five floors. No lifts, just the stairs.


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Job cuts: rightsizing the oil and gas industry

THE slide in global crude oil prices has left a trail of casualties in its wake.

Oil companies and governments that rely on the price of crude oil for profit and revenue have been hurt by plunging receipts from lower crude oil prices.

For countries dependent on commodities such as crude oil, the effect cuts deeper. Their currencies have felt the brunt from the weaker crude oil prices and it is this group of countries that have a reliance on commodities that have seen the biggest depreciation against the US dollar compared with oil importing countries.

While the macro picture hogs the headlines and generates most of the chatter, the real micro cost of plunging crude oil prices has been felt by employment in the sector.

Many oil majors have announced job cuts to manage costs that had spiralled upwards during the boom days in the industry. Oil majors now have resorted to slashing their workforce amid the biggest downturn in the industry for decades.

For Malaysia, that impact is telling. Between January and July, the Malaysian labour market has laid off 6,547 people (not inclusive the voluntary separation schemes for Malaysia Airlines and banks). But 30% of that number, or nearly 2,000 people who lost their jobs, have come from the oil and gas industry alone.

“It is getting worse,” an oil industry executive says on the job cuts plaguing the industry. He says the oil major he works for is in the midst of a rightsizing exercise and that will mean many jobs will need to be slashed in the coming months.

“We have to reach a new equilibrium for the economies in the oil and gas sector.”

And it does not seem like the industry has hit a trough when it comes to retrenchment.

Part of that is down to the outlook for the price of crude oil. Although there is optimism that prices have hit a bottom, there is another school of thought that predicts more pain for the sector.

Supply from shale oil and future Iranian oil, once trade sanctions are lifted, are clouding the supply dynamics for crude oil and gas.

With expectation that oil prices will remain weak for the foreseeable future, oil majors continue to announce job layoffs. More jobs are expected to be cut next year.

In the US alone, oil companies are reported to have laid off more than 86,000 personnel from June last year up to September of this year. With many global giants having a presence in Malaysia, the workforce in the country will likely be included as part of a global cut in workforce.

Poor profit

The main culprit for job cuts among oil and gas has been the financial performance of those companies. As profits plunge, the knee-jerk reaction is to cut costs, and employment is in the crosshair of such cuts.

The hit on leaner employment prospects has already been told through not only the fall in crude oil prices but also cuts in capital expenditure and operating expenditure by Petronas Nasional Bhd. Companies that service the upstream segment of the industry have been the worst hit.


Downsizing: The main culprit for job cuts among oil and gas has been the financial performance of O&G companies. As profits plunge, the knee-jerk reaction is to cut costs, and employment is in the crosshair of such cuts. — EPA

Petronas, the driver of the local oil and gas industry, has cut its operating costs and that has meant lesser demand for services provided by the oil and gas industry.

An industry official says Petronas, for its part, is not retrenching employees at the moment despite pressure to maintain profitability. It will cut bonuses in order to keep its permanent staff.

“There is no rightsizing of permanent staff at Petronas but whether it renews the contracts of high-paying employees is another thing,” he says.

The hardest hit segment on the industry’s value chain has been upstream activity. The cut in the number of exploration rigs and the associated services indicates the predicament the industry is going through.

The collapse in the price of crude oil has meant that companies are less inclined to spend on searching for new sources of crude oil. It makes matters worse when it is already costly to search for such oil in areas such as deepwater oil fields.

“As revenue comes down, staff are being redeployed from upstream to downstream. Staff will also be asked to multi-task but whether they can do that is another thing,” he says.

A pickup in hiring activity in the upstream segment is not expected as long as crude oil prices are anaemic.

Job cuts have taken place in that segment as a result of dimmed prospects in the industry.

With prices not expected to bounce up significantly, job prospects will remain dim. The general consensus is that crude oil prices are expected to remain sluggish for the short- to medium-term and that has necessitated the cut in expenditure and staff costs.

Trickle down effects

The oil and gas sector is not the only segment that has laid off workers as the pace of retrenchments seemed to have picked up pace.

Maybank Investment Bank says in a report that retrenchments rose sharply in the second quarter, up 56.7% year-on-year to 3,213 in the second quarter compared with a 14.4% increase to 2,789 in the first quarter of this year. “Retrenchments in the construction sector went up as a number of major projects are nearing completion amid slow replenishment rate. The oil and gas sector’s retrenchment has been on the uptrend since the second half of 2014, coinciding with the plunge in crude oil price.

“At the same time, services industries like ‘finance, insurance, real & business services’ and ‘transport, storage & communications’ also showed uptrends,” it says.

Between January and July of this year, statistics indicate that 47% of retrenched workers are skilled, 40% semi-skilled and 13% unskilled.

It is the loss of skilled jobs, such as that by the oil and gas sector, that will have a big knock-on effect on the rest of the economy. The higher than average salaries that those workers once commanded will evaporate from the system and the absence of which will trickle down to the different sectors of the economy.

The slump in the industry has already been felt in the areas surrounding KL City Centre (KLCC), which is said to be the operational hub for oil and gas companies in Malaysia.

Hotel occupancy is down in Kuala Lumpur, especially those around KLCC. The Kuala Lumpur Shangri-la, which is the benchmark for hoteliers in the country, has announced a 10% drop in revenue in the second quarter of this year.

Apart from hotels, rental demand for houses surrounding the KLCC area has been acutely felt with the loss of jobs in the oil and gas industry.

“There has been a knee-jerk reaction especially around the KLCC area,” says a property consultant.

He says tenancies have been cancelled with oil and gas workers retrenched and for those who still have their jobs, their employers are housing them in different areas in the city.

“The numbers are down but it is not significant. There has, however, been a downgrade in the choice of accommodation,” he says.

The outlook though is not going to be rosy. With gross domestic product clocking a growth rate of 4.9% in the second quarter compared with growth of 5.6% in the first quarter, the slower growth rate will eventually bite into the prospects of employment.

“The labour market lags economic activity. There will be a lag of one or two quarters as companies won’t immediately lay off workers,” says an official.

By JAGDEV SINGH SIDHU

Fewer job vacancies due to wait-and-see attitude.

INDUSTRY experts say the shrinking number of job vacancies in the country is due to companies adopting a “wait and see” approach, putting on hold any expansion plans because of economic uncertainty..

Other worse-affected businesses which cannot afford to wait, they said, are downsizing, contributing to the rising number of retrenchments that totalled 6,547 until July this year..

While retrenchments are pressured to rise, what is worrisome is that the number of job vacancies has been on a decline over the past few years. The new openings for jobs have fallen from 1.62 million jobs in 2012 and 1.4 million in 2013 to only 1.07 million last year..

The biggest drop in vacancies was seen in the manufacturing sector, followed by the services sector..

Vacancies in the manufacturing sector fell from 598,890 in 2012 to 352,784 positions last year, a massive 45% drop in just three years..

Retrenchments in the sector was also the highest last year with 5,716 job cuts..

In the services sector, job vacancies went down from 369,983 in 2012 to 275,199 available positions in 2014, while retrenchments were up by an additional 1,151..

The construction sector also saw fewer job vacancies last year, with only 202,878 positions compared to 310,954 two years earlier..

Vacancies in the mining and quarrying sectors saw a marginal increase, up 19% from 2,180 to 2,605 jobs. But conditions have soured in the mining industry led by the slump in global crude oil prices..

The sector saw retrenchments surge almost four-fold from only 81 in 2012 to 318 job cuts last year..

Economist Yeah Kim Leng says the authorities must scrutinise data very carefully to find out to what extent the drop in job opportunities are due to the slowdown in investments and business expansions..

“The Government needs to look at the factors affecting business confidence and the measures to alleviate these factors..

“Given that the investment pipeline seems healthy, the declining number of vacancies is very surprising,” he says..

Yeah expects the situation to improve in the second half of next year, once the Chinese economy stabilises and commodity prices recover..

The Government is currently mulling the possibility of setting up an Employment Insurance Scheme to help retrenched workers in the country..

Deputy Human Resources Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Abd Muttalib said early this month that the scheme, aimed at helping retrenched workers through temporary financial aid, reskilling and upskilling, was announced in Budget 2015 last year..

“In Malaysia, during the economic crisis of 1997-1998 and 2008-2009, we had a steady increase of unfair dismissal cases filed at the Industrial Relations Department. “After those periods, the cases returned to a normal pace. With an economic downturn possibly occurring in the near future, we are getting worried that dismissal and retrenchment cases would go up tremendously,” he said..

The total job loss in Malaysia as a result of the 2008/09 global economic crisis was around 40,000, out of which around 60% were in the manufacturing sector..

This was less severe compared with the estimated total job loss of 84,000 during the 1997/98 Asian financial crisis..

The unemployment problem in Malaysia during the global economic crisis was somewhat cushioned by the “more considerate” strategies taken by companies, which included cutting down their operating hours or days and reducing the salaries of their workers, so as to retain as many workers as they possibly could, instead of cutting headcount..

Weak business sentiment.

Although there has been an increase in investment approvals by the Malaysian Investment Development Authority, Yeah says, business sentiment needs to be monitored..

“We must monitor closely to see if they are going ahead with their investments or are pulling out,” he says..

Business conditions in Malaysia have deteriorated this year, with the Business Conditions Index by the Malaysian Institute of Economic Research painting a grim outlook after the second quarter of the year..

The index fell to 95.4 points from 101 points in the previous quarter. A reading below 100 indicates pessimism..

It also found that the local and export sales outlook was bleak, and capacity utilisation rate had dipped further..

The survey, conducted each quarter to assist in assessing the short-term economic outlook, covers a sample of over 350 manufacturing businesses operating in 11 industries..

Areas explored include production level, new order bookings, sales performances, inventory build-up and new job openings..

In June, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Abdul Wahid Omar said although Malaysia had more than 400,000 people looking for jobs at any given time, the Government had set a target that 75% of graduates would find employment within six months of graduation..

According to the latest numbers from the Department of Statistics, in July this year, there were 459,900 Malaysians unemployed compared to 394,100 in July last year, a 16.7% increase..

The unemployment numbers have been on a rise every month since April this year, from 429,000 to 460,000 persons jobless in July..

Malaysian Employers Federation executive director Datuk Shamsuddin Bardan says the situation is worrying as it means that many graduates would not be able to secure employment due to the shrinking number of vacancies..

“The ability to create middle-level management vacancies is a challenge now due to the economic condition..

“Nobody is sure what is going to happen, so companies have adopted a wait-and-see attitude..

“They are not making any new commitments. They are just maintaining what they have – if possible – or downsizing,” he says..

Shamsuddin says employers need the extra confidence from authorities in order to fix the situation..

“To stimulate employment, incentives have to be given directly to the sector. For example, there are incentives for companies that hire women who have been on a career break for over six months..

“The same can be done for companies that hire fresh graduates, for example, who have not secured jobs after a certain period,” he says..

This, he says, could be in the form of salary subsidies for the first few months..

By P. ARUNA.

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South Koreans fight over jobs

Why South Koreans with ‘best jobs’ take only one day off per year

Young and Old Fight Over Jobs in Korea as Generation Gap Widens

With youth unemployment near a 15-year high and the government planning to raise the retirement age, intergenerational conflict over jobs is rising in South Korea.

The jobless rate for workers aged 15 to 29 touched 11 percent earlier this year and is about four times higher than for those aged 40 and above. At the other end of the spectrum, Korea has an underdeveloped pension system and the highest elderly poverty rate in the OECD, as companies push employees in their fifties into early retirement to contain costs.

An overall unemployment rate that’s close to the 10-year average belies the difficulty facing policy makers seeking to balance the needs of the young and the old as society ages and economic growth eases after the heady gains of previous decades.

Working longer would have helped Lee Jong Ho, 59, who retired from Korea Railroad Corp. two years ago and has been looking for another job ever since. Lee’s 2.2 million won ($1,970) monthly pension isn’t enough to support him and his wife, after pouring savings into raising their children.

“Healthy people like me should work at least until 70 given that the average life span of people now is easily over 80,” said Lee. “I know that extending the retirement age could mean fewer jobs for young people. I’m willing to get paid a little less if I can keep working.”

While currently there is no official retirement age in South Korea, a typical worker’s career ends around 53, government data show. After that, many try to get by on a combination of pension payments, savings, part-time work or small business ventures.

A new law taking effect next year mandates that large companies allow employees to work until at least 60.

‘Repeating Class’

Kang Jin Ho, an English major at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in Seoul, is 26 and still trying to get into the workforce. He’s deferred graduating for years to maximize his employment chances, as many companies limit new entry hires to people still in school. Kang’s applied for more than 70 jobs already in 2015 and has been rejected every time.

“Getting a job was so much easier for my parents’ generation, when the economy was expanding fast,” he said. “The average age of job seekers in my study group is 30.”

Projections from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development paint a gloomy picture for Kang and the next generation of students who will follow. The number of people 65 and older in Korea will surge from 11 percent in 2010 to more than 37 percent by 2050, according to the OECD.

Park’s Plan

The unemployment rate for those aged 15 to 29 was 9.3 percent in May, Statistics Korea said Wednesday. That’s the highest figure for May in official data going back to June 1999, and compares with 2.7 percent for people 40-49 and 2.6 percent for the 50-59 group. Young people are also seeking stable jobs and many apply for the civil service exam, which pushes up the youth unemployment rate, said Sim Won Bo, director at Statistics Korea.

President Park Geun Hye’s government will next month announce its fourth set of measures in two years to help ease unemployment among the young.

Previous efforts have included improvements to career training at school and incentives for young people to join small- and medium-sized enterprises, not just the large corporate icons that dominate the public imagination.

This time around the government may begin addressing the problems faced by Lee and Kang at the same time.

Tenure System

According to a finance ministry statement in May, financial support could be offered to companies that keep on older workers, while trimming their wages and using the savings to hire more young employees. The ministry didn’t offer further details.

Labor unions have already voiced opposition to the idea of a peak-wage system, which also runs counter to cultural traditions of basing pay on tenure and age, rather than performance.

“In a rapidly aging society with weak growth momentum, you’re going to get conflict between young and old over how to divide economic benefits,” said Lee Geun Tae, an economist at the LG Economic Research Institute in Seoul. “Young people having proper jobs is important for our growth engine, but there doesn’t seem to be an easy solution.”

Source: Bloomberg by Kim ChipmanCynthia Kim

Retirement Redesigned

Baby Boomers, Work and the Endless Vacation

By Victoria Stilwell and Roger Runningen | Updated Jun 10, 2015 4:20 PM EDT

The baby boom generation already has left its mark on music, fitness and politics. Next up: retirement. While some people dream of the same “golden age” of relaxation, sun and travel their parents enjoyed, many more have looked at the numbers and decided they have to keep working. (It takes a lot of savings to finance a 30-year vacation.) For others, working is a choice. (Why give up a good income and fulfilling career?) Either way, the generation famous for rewriting the rules is now reshaping life after 65.

The Situation

Demographics are forcing changes in expectations for retirement. The number of senior citizens worldwide will swell to 714 million in 2020 from 601 million in 2015, straining government benefit plans. Meanwhile, the world’s birthrate is declining. Fewer workers mean fewer people paying into pension programs. So governments are encouraging or forcing people to work longer. Twenty percent of people over 65 are still working in Japan, whose median age of 46.1 gives it the world’s second-oldest population (surpassed only by Monaco at 51.1). There’s room for growth: Surveys show 80 percent of Japanese seniors want to work. Some are finding it hard to live comfortably on pensions alone. Others share the feelings of a 69-year-old who said: “Life is boring without work.”


Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics


The Background

German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck offered the elderly the world’s first national old-age pension system in 1889. In the U.S., the first private pension plan was begun by American Express in 1875. By 1929, one-tenth of the American work force was covered under company pension plans. Yet that same year, even before the Great Depression hit, 56 percent of Americans 65 and older couldn’t support themselves. The Social Security law that passed in 1935 included a pension plan. During World War II, wage controls in the U.S. led employers to offer pensions as a way to attract workers. Private pensions expanded through the 1970s until they covered almost half of American workers. By the 1950s, retirees had money to spend and they wanted to play. The number of golf courses in the U.S. doubled from about 5,000 in the 1950s to more than 10,000 in the 1980s. America’s first retirement community, Sun City, opened outside of Phoenix in 1960. Tours and programs designed for older travelers, such as Elderhostel, founded in 1975, helped them see the world. Things began to change in 1980 with the introduction of 401(k) plans, which allowed U.S. workers to avoid taxes on income put aside for retirement. Subsequent tax-law changes removed incentives for companies to maintain traditional pension plans. Savings plans that relied on the stock market lost value with every crash and tough economic times caused many to take early withdrawals from their retirement savings. Fewer U.S. homeowners reaching retirement age have paid off their mortgages. The result: American baby boomers are poorer than their parents who golfed, lived in sunny climates and traveled.

The Argument

Baby boomers are starting retirement without much in the bank. More than one-fifth of Americans 65 and older are working and more people expect to work past traditional retirement age. They may be needed — certain industries, like construction and manufacturing, are facing shortages of skilled workers. Healthy seniors often want to stay on the job even if they don’t need the money, though in areas like academia this may be preventing younger people from advancing. Governments are certainly encouraging older people to work. In 2011, the U.K. abolished its default retirement age of 65; most people can now work as long as they want. The graying of the workforce is likely to continue. When asked what age they expect to retire, 10 percent of American baby boomers say “never.”

The Reference Shelf

Gallup has a series of polls on baby boomers and retirement.

Financial Times Magazine article, “How Japan stood up to old age.”

Bloomberg Visual Data on the impact of an aging world population.

National Public Radio interviewed older workers for its series, “Working Late.”

PBS NewsHour interactive report, “New Adventures for Older Workers.

First Published Sept. 18, 2014
To contact the writer of this QuickTake:

Victoria Stilwell at vstilwell1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this QuickTake:
Anne Cronin at acronin14@bloomberg.net

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Malaysia tops Job Asia Index, job ads on the rise

New job postings in Malaysia soared in Q4 2014, on the back of Putrajaya’s success in drawing in more multinational firms, according to recruitment consultancy Robert Walters. http://www.robertwalters.com.my/

Out of the six Asian markets that were surveyed in the agency’s job index for Q4 2014, Malaysia witnessed the biggest jump in the number of new jobs advertised, or an increase by 48 percent over the same period in 2013.

Titled “Asia at a glance,” the index ranked Japan second as it grew 42 percent due to improved business confidence, while China and Singapore grew at 19 percent and 23 percent respectively, owing to growth in online retail and increased regulatory requirements.

Overall, Asia witnessed an increase of 18 percent in job advertisement figures.

Sally Raj, managing director of Robert Walters Malaysia, attributed Malaysia’s status as one of Southeast Asia’s fastest growing markets to Putrajaya’s success in attracting more multinational firms.

“The government’s initiatives to strengthen infrastructure and increase business operational efficiency continues to attract increasing numbers of multinationals to the country. This explains the encouraging increases in job advertising volumes we have seen across 2014,” she said.

She said firms in Malaysia have expressed concerns over the goods and services tax that will roll out this April, making 2015 an “interesting year.”

Robert Walters noted that there was a shortage of technically skilled job applicants in Malaysia, with advertising of job openings for IT candidates climbing by 75 percent, while recruitment for those in accounting and finance as well as marketing rose by 63 percent and 55 percent respectively.

Meanwhile, the 33 percent rise in job advertisements for logistics was driven by the country’s emerging status as a key regional hub for logistics and manufacturing, while the 31 percent hike in retail job postings is due to the opening up of new malls and new international brands.

With offices in 24 countries and regions, Robert Walters revealed that it compiled the Asia Job Index by monitoring advertising volumes for recruitment in leading job boards and national newspapers in the six regions.

By Farah Wahida, Editor of PropertyGuru, wrote this story. To contact her about this or other stories email farahwahida@propertyguru.com.my

Malaysian Job ads on the rise

PETALING JAYA: Job advertisements in Malaysia grew by 48% overall in the fourth quarter of last year, with experts saying this proves that Government initiatives and the stress on business operational efficiency is bearing fruit.

Recruitment consultancy Robert Walters in its Asia Job Index for Q4 2014 report said Malaysia was one of the fastest progressing markets, out of the six countries surveyed in Southeast Asia.

“The Government’s initiatives to strengthen infrastructure and increase business operational efficiency continue to attract increasing numbers of multinationals to the country.

“This explains the encouraging increase in job advertising volumes we have seen across last year,” said Robert Walters Malaysia managing director Sally Raj in the report.

She said companies were continuously trying to reach out to top talents in the market.

“In order to ensure further growth, hiring managers are producing very strong retention strategies to keep their best performers.

“This year will be an interesting year ahead as businesses have already expressed concerns around the Goods and Services Tax (GST) which will be implemented in April,” she added.

Japan came second at 42% due to improved business confidence while Singapore grew at 23% due to their Fair Consideration Framework.

The framework, which came in effect last August, obliges hiring managers to consider Singaporeans first for all vacancies. China grew 19% due to the growth in online retail.

Hong Kong trailed behind at 15% as companies seek to upskill their teams by hiring professionals with stronger skill sets and replacing underperformers.

South Korea meanwhile recorded a 3% growth due to positive policy changes by the government.

The report also revealed that IT candidates remained in demand, with the shortage of technically skilled job applicants being a key factor in the 75% rise in job advertising.

This is followed by those in accounting and finance (63%), and marketing (55%).

“Malaysia’s emerging status as a key manufacturing and logistics hub in Southeast Asia drove job advertising in logistics up 33% from 2013,” the firm noted.

Apart from that, the emergence of new shopping malls and the entrance of more international brands in Malaysia created a strong 31% increase in 2013 for retail job advertising especially within the luxury and mass label markets.

By Hemananthani Sivanandam The Star/Asia News Network

Tech-Dome Penang project to be ready by 2015; Skilled Staff in Demand in Penang

An artist's impression of the RM23mil Tech-Dome in Komtar, Penang.

About Tech-Dome Penang

Tech-Dome Penang is an initiative by the Penang Science Cluster to create a hub for technology learning and exchange of ideas. It will be a vehicle for improving scientific literacy and technology ability in Malaysia.

Located at the geodesic dome of KOMTAR just adjacent to the George Town UNESCO World Heritage Site in Penang, visitors will discover the exciting world of technology and how they work by exploring the world-class exhibits in its galleries. Regular programs will be conducted for schools, colleges and families that are specially designed to cultivate the spirit of inquiry and teach children and teenagers the skills required to thrive in a high-tech, knowledge-based future.

OUR MISSION

• To inspire children and students to become future technologists and nurture the interest to use and invent technology. 

• To cultivate the spirit of inquiry and nurture the passion to thrive in the fields of science, engineering and technology. 

• To showcase the progress of the world’s technology and innovation. 

• To highlight the convergence of technology, industry and people.

Why Do We Need Tech-Dome Penang?

We believe that learning is a lifelong journey of discovery and is not just limited to school lessons. Families, young adults and entrepreneurs are always looking for new ideas and stimulating and meaningful ways to spend their time. By creating Tech-Dome Penang, we will offer visitors fun-filled learning and a place to share ideas and be inspired.

For Penang and Malaysia to remain competitive in the global economy, we must continue to nurture and develop our ability to use and even invent technology. However, the 2011 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) showed that the standard of mathematics and science among Malaysian students have been dropping since 2003, and compared to all other countries, Malaysia is the country with the biggest and most drastic drop in scores from 1999 to 2011.

According to the Ministry of Education, less and less students are taking up science at the STPM level. This shows that fewer students are interested in participating in the fields of science, engineering and technology. Tech-Dome Penang aims to reverse this trend and will strive to cultivate curiosity and nurture the passion to thrive in these fields.

Tech-Dome ready by 2015 

THE RM23mil Tech-Dome Penang project, a private initiative with endorsement from the state and Federal Government, aims to be operational by end of 2015.

Penang Tech Centre Bhd chairman Datuk Wong Siew Hai said Tech-Dome, to be located on the fifth floor of Komtar with a 32,000sq ft built-up area, would showcase robotic, electronics and computing and lighting technologies.

“It will also exhibit the history of Penang’s industrialisation, spearheaded by the electronics and IT sectors.

“We have appointed Huettinger, a renowned company from Germany, as design consultant for the project.

“Huettinger is a technology-engineering company specialising in exhibition planning, providing consultation services, and manufacturing of exhibits,” he said in an interview yesterday.

[ Wong says a fully programmable robot called Robo Thespian will be created to educate, communicate, interact and entertain visitors to the science centre. ]

Wong said Tech-Dome would serve as a science centre to inspire children and students to become future technologists and also to nurture their interest to use and invent technology.

“Instead of taking children to movies and shopping, parents will have the alternative to take them to visit Tech-Dome during weekends.

“A robot built by Huettinger will be employed for meeting, greeting, and interacting with the public.
“Known as Robo Thespian, the robot is a fully programmable humanoid robot created to educate, communicate, interact and entertain,” he said.

Wong said the Tech-Dome had so far collected RM3.65mil, of which RM1.15mil came from the state government with the remainder from the corporate sector.

He added that the private sector had also pledged to donate RM2.3mil for the project.

“We still need another RM17.35mil which we are confident of raising by the end of 2014.

“Those who sponsor now will be known as founding sponsors of the project,” he said.

Penang Centre director Yap Soo Huey said unlike other science centres, the Tech-Dome would not just exhibit products.

“It will be designed to link the exhibits to scientific principles and their applications,” she said.

By David Tan The Star/Asia News Network

Penang Tech Centre To Complete Tech-Dome By 2nd Half Of 2015

GEORGE TOWN, Aug 5 (Bernama) -- Penang Tech Centre Bhd strives to complete the RM23 million Tech-Dome Penang project by the second half of 2015.

General manager Richard Chung Chok Yin said the renovation work to house the centre at the Tun Abdul Razak Complex's (Komtar) Geodesic Dome would begin next month and take nine months to complete.

"We still need to raise about RM10 million from the private sector and the public to bring this project to fruition," he told reporters here Tuesday.

Chung said donations could be made online via www.techdomepenang.org and tax-exempt receipts would be issued for contributions above RM50.

A private initiative with endorsement from the state and federal government, the Tech-Dome Penang is aimed at improving scientific literacy and technology acumen among Malaysians.

Earlier, Penang Tech Centre director Yap Soo Huey said a series of roadshows themed the 'Magic of Science' would be held in Gurney Plaza, Queensbay Mall, Gurney Paragon and First Avenue Mall from Aug to Dec to create public awareness on the Tech-Dome Penang.

"The roadshows will showcase science and technology-related activities on nature, math and science, life sciences, robotics and astronomy, mainly for children up to 15 years," she said.

-- BERNAMA

Financial hiccup - needs RM10mil boost

RM23mil Tech-Dome Penang project seeks public donation to help cover RM10mil shortfall. THE RM23mil Tech-Dome Penang project, a private initiative with endorsement from the state and Federal Government, is still short of RM10mil.

Status update: (From left) Chung, PTC director Datuk Lim Kok Khong, Yap, PTC steering committee member Ang Lye Hin and representatives of sponsors at the press conference.

Penang Tech Centre Bhd (PTC) general manager Richard Chung said they needed the financial support from corporate sectors and the public to help turn the project into a reality.

“We welcome any form of public donation. I am sure with such support, we should be able to make further headway in this project,” he said during a press conference in Komtar yesterday.

Tech-Dome Penang is a science and technology centre that aims to be a hub for technology learning and exchange of ideas.

The state government, besides granting the use of Komtar Geodesic Dome to house the centre, also provided seed-funding for the project. The centre is expected to be ready by second half next year.

PTC director Yap Soo Huey, who is also Pulau Tikus assemblyman, said the project would brand Penang as a hub for innovation and creativity.

She said cities that were known for being dynamic, progressive and innovative always boasted of having science and technology centres.

“Look at San Francisco and Amsterdam. That speaks volume of the city itself.

“Besides, we have been hearing that our education syllabus is too rigid, employees either cannot think out of the box or lack ideas when seeking a solution.

“The purpose of Tech-Dome is to address all this. We want to inspire our children to see how technology can be different and how knowledge can be applied to produce wonders. Education is not just about memorising,” she said.

As part of brand-building and public awareness, Tech-Dome Penang will organise nine roadshows scheduled to take place at the various shopping malls in Penang until the end of the year. Each roadshow will last for two days.

The first roadshow will be held at Gurney Plaza this weekend followed by Queensbay Mall (Aug 30/31), Gurney Paragon (Sept 13/14), Queensbay Mall (Sept 20/21), Gurney Paragon (Nov 29/30), Gurney Plaza (Dec 6/7), Queensbay Mall (Dec 13/14), 1st Avenue (Dec 20/21) and Gurney Plaza (Dec 27/28).

The roadshows, themed ‘Magic of Science’, will showcase various science and technology-related activities and games focusing on nature, mathematics and science, life sciences, robotics and astronomy for children aged up to 15.

The public will be able to participate in interesting hands-on activities from noon till 7pm during the event days.

More details on the roadshows can be obtained from http://www.techdomepenang.org or via Facebook /techdomepenang.

Donations can be made at the roadshows. Tax-exempted receipts will be issued for contributions above RM50 or via the website.

Skilled Staff in Demand - Jobs await seekers

Over 2,600 vacancies in various sectors are waiting to be filled and more investors are coming to Penang to offer greater employment opportunities abound including high-value positions over the next few years.

A new investor coming to Batu Kawan has about 300 positions to fill in 2016 and 1,000 in the following five years. — DATUK LEE KAH CHOON

AS of July 2014, there are 2,635 jobs available in Penang, of which 74% are for positions as junior executive and above.

Of the 2,635 jobs, some 475 are in engineering, 222 in marketing and business development, 185 in general and cost accounting, 185 in manufacturing, and 170 in IT-software, while the remaining 1,538 are for vacancies in other sectors.

InvestPenang executive director Datuk Lee Kah Choon said the openings were reported in a popular job portal.

Feedback received by investPenang and Penang Career Assistance and Talent (CAT) Centre, shows there are a number of multinational corporations (MNC) with various vacancies to be filled up.

Lee said a Japanese MNC in Seberang Prai was looking for technicians and engineers as part of its exercise to fill 1,500 vacancies.

“An American MNC in Bayan Lepas is also looking for 50 design engineers, while in the services sector, there are vacancies for 60 finance and accounting officers.

“A new investor coming to Batu Kawan has about 300 positions to fill in 2016 and 1,000 in the following five years.

“Another new MNC in Batu Kawan requires 540 vacancies to be filled by the end of this year,” he said.

Lee said the proposed Penang Business Process Outsourcing Prime project was expected to generate about 21,000 high-value jobs over the next five years.

“Penang is expanding from high-capital expenditure manufacturing and the state’s next growth wave hinges on investments in shared services outsourcing and other services that create higher value job opportunities for the people.

“However, the challenges of availability of right talents and well-trained workforce that meet demands of global investors have to be urgently addressed,” Lee stressed.

Lee said CAT was now working on setting up a fund to provide eligible students with scholarships and loans to pursue tertiary education.

“We are now talking with MNCs and philanthropists in Penang to set up such a fund for CAT to disburse to students, who will then work in MNCs during their vacation and upon graduation,” he said.

Lee also said investPenang was now arranging for foreign students to serve their internship in MNCs here.

“Students from New Zealand should be here next month for their internship in the local MNCs,” Lee said.

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Financial talent crunch worsen

PETALING JAYA: The talent crunch in the local financial services sector is expected to worsen in the coming years partly driven by the Gen Y segment that currently makes up about 25% of the workforce in the banking system.

Asian Institute of Finance (AIF) chief executive officer Dr Raymond Madden said that the talent shortage could be due to the lack of understanding on how to cope with the Gen Y group.

Madden:‘At the moment this group of people (Gen Y) makes up about 40% of the current workforce in Malaysia.

“Within the next eight to nine years, we expect the Gen Y workforce in the banking system to rise to about 50% from 25% currently, which means that almost half of the people working in banks will be Gen Y employees, namely those below 30 years of age.

“At the moment this group of people (Gen Y) makes up about 40% of the current workforce in Malaysia and in many Asean countries. This number is expected to increase to 75% within a relatively short span of time,’’ he told StarBiz.

According to the Financial Sector Blueprint published in 2011, the workforce number in the financial sector stood at 144,000. It is anticipated that over the next 10 years, the sector would require a workforce of about 200,000, an increase of 56,000 from the current 144,000 employees.

Madden said among the sectors in the financial services industry that were facing talent shortage was in Islamic finance, notably in the areas of syariah expertise.

Besides this, he added, the crucial areas in the banking system facing talent shortage were in credit and risk management, corporate finance, treasury and wealth management.

He said due to the expected rise of the Gen Y workforce in the financial services in the coming years, banks and other financial services sectors needed to have a better understanding and knowledge of this group.

This group, he said, was looking at what he termed as the three E’s – engage, enrich and empower. He described Gen Y as an impatient lot as they wanted to be prominent in the organisation and would join another organisation if they did not achieve their targets.

As this group was ambitious and wanted to climb up the career ladder as quick as possible unlike their older counterparts, hence employers needed to know how to deal effectively with the Gen Y segment.

Towards this end, Madden said AIF – through its four affiliate institutions – was working closely to beef up talent in the financial services sector.

The affiliates are Institute of Bankers Malaysia (IBBM), Islamic Banking and Finance Institute Malaysia (IBFIM), The Malaysian Insurance Institute (MII) and Securities Industries Development Corp (SIDC).

For example, he said the Financial Sector Talent Enrichment Programme (FSTEP), which is run by IBBM, had played an important role in training new graduates in the financial services industry.

FSTEP is an intensive-training programme that prepares trainees for the operational aspects of finance and banking.

AIF in collaboration with UK-based Ashbridge Business School carried out a survey this year, which among others, showed that 22% of Gen Y employees in Malaysia believed it was reasonable for them to be in a management role within six months of starting work at their respective organisations.

Commenting on the survey, he said there were also inter-generation gaps that existed in the financial services industry between the Gen Y and their older managers, adding that there was a clear difference in perception of Gen Y managers and Gen Ys themselves.

The survey polled 1,200 financial services professionals, including senior human resources personnel who actively manage Gen Ys in their respective organisations.

Contributed by by Daljit Dhesi - The Star/Asia News Network

It is a small world

The world is actually quite small

EVERY week, I go to the nearby wet market to stock up on provisions. One of the stalls I have to stop by is run by a young man who knows that I am there to collect my weekly quota of 20 kampung eggs.

Recently I asked him if he might want to consider starting up an online service to provide home delivery to his regular customers. After all, even the major hypermarkets are going big time in providing such a service to tap into the trend of people being so busy that grocery shopping needs another approach.

His reply tells me once again that true wisdom rests among ordinary people who truly know what the real world is all about. You can grab quotations from wise men and manage­ment gurus but sometimes the real gems are from people like my egg seller.

He basically told me that it is better for me to come out and get the chance to meet people rather than stay in the house. Every moment in any public area, he said, is fresh and unpredictable.

“You can bump into people you have not met for a long time or come across something interesting that cheers you up when you are feeling down,” he said.

The egg seller is correct to say that every moment in public is fresh and unpredictable. I have always believed that nothing happens by chance. Some call it divine appointments but it is this connection of one human to another that opens up a myriad of possibilities.

Through such encounters, we learn that the world is actually quite small once we start connecting the dots and learn that the person we have just met is actually not quite a stranger after all.

As much as I love the written word, I find that it is the spoken word, with all the body language appended, that conveys the true meaning of what we want to say.

To tell someone you are sorry through a card is easy even if you do not really mean it. But to say you are sorry up close and personal, you’d better mean what you say or else.

Those who are less socially inclined than I am will disagree when I say that we are not created to be solitary beings. We need company to flourish in thought and in deed.

We can talk about feeling the pulse of the people and of being connected to the grassroots, but if we are only doing so from the comfort of our living room or office, we will never get the real picture.

Some of the things I read online will make me think there is absolutely no hope left in the country, but when I am out there, I realise that this is just not the case.

Take a ride on the bus or the LRT, drop in to see a friend at the hospital, take a walk around the neighbourhood, have a chat with the grasscutter ...

Then you will learn that the world we live in is a wonderful place because the people make it so.

And we do so by not merely looking out for our own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.

In this season of Christmas, it is my hope that we do our part to reach out and love one another. We can, and we will, make a difference.

Contributed by Soo Ewe Jin. He wishes all Christian readers a blessed Christmas with a gentle reminder that this is the season not only for giving but for forgiving as well.

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Get pay from spying?

Whistleblowing hero: Germans holding up pictures of Snowden while protesting in front of the Reichstag building which houses the Bundestag (lower house of parliament) in Berlin . — AFP

Heavy-duty spying does not pay 

The hidden costs, and the controversy, of the massive US global spying operation keep on growing.

IF officials behind the US-based “Five Eyes” spying network had hoped the scandal would soon fade away, their obvious disappointment should be an object lesson about their excesses and abuses.



US, British, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand spies – together with their Singaporean and South Korean co-conspirators – had violated the implicit trust placed in their governments by friendly and ally nations around the world.

Former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden had exposed how the conspirators had tapped into fibre-optic cables in 20 locations worldwide and infiltrated 50,000 computer networks.

This unprecedented scale of spying makes no distinction between friend and foe. It has provoked questions about the value of being a friend or “ally” of these Western countries.

Countries in the world’s main regions have routinely been spied on: Europe, East Asia, West Asia and Latin America. The spying exceeds all norms of intelligence gathering to target the personal cell phones of national leaders, from German Chancellor Angela Merkel to Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and even his wife Ibu Ani Yudhoyono.

Snowden’s leaks reveal that Spain, for example, had been spied on so much as to have 20 million phone calls tapped each day. For the US authorities to insist that it was all for the sake of fighting terrorism is too much of a stretch.

The spying covers economic as well as political purposes. It was revealed that a foreign government’s confidential information picked up from spying is also used to give an unfair advantage to US companies against other companies in bids for international contracts.

Today’s supercomputers can do a lot of work in very little time. The ones used in the US global spying scheme apparently had very little ethical human supervision, precisely because that was the intention.

It has long been a “given” that all countries gather intelligence, to varying degrees, through some of their diplomats, expatriates and other undercover operatives. The extent of this activity also varies with the distance in relations between the spying country and the one spied upon.

Between friendly countries, discussions on issues of common interest and concern are the means of updating one another on events. Excessively intrusive and invasive spying, however, such as the kind Snowden has revealed, is supposed to be for untrustworthy governments and enemy nations.

Such universal perceptions and expectations lie at the heart of the current spying controversy. There is little wonder that countries so sordidly spied on take the matter so seriously.

Such spying shows the United States would enforce its will on all other countries, as opposed to sharing information between equal partners with mutual respect. It also implies that rules will be made by the US alone.

At the bilateral meeting in Jakarta during the week between Malaysian Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak and Susilo, Malaysia declared full support for Indonesia in placing the spying scandal on the agenda of the next Asean Summit in Myanmar.

In seeking a satisfactory corrective for spying intrusions that breach all known limits, granting a regional profile to the problem is the least that Indonesia and Malaysia can do. Thailand is another Asean country targeted by these spies operating in part from the respective Australian embassies.

France and Germany are particularly outraged by “Five Eyes” snooping. Italy, the Netherlands and Spain are also concerned, as the scandal unites political parties within individual nations as well as European countries throughout the EU – except for Britain.

The aggrieved countries find the excessive spying violating privacy rights, their national sovereignty as well as their domestic laws. US officials predictably reject its seriousness.

The EU now wants a new law requiring private IT companies to inform European regulators if a foreign snooping request is made on any European citizen. That effort could clash with an existing US law that bans any company whose “cooperation” is required from telling anyone.

The potential conflict would pit European determination against US intransigence. It would further test the trans-Atlantic alliance in the post-Cold War period.

As the initial leaks started to provoke European anger, clandestine efforts tried to dilute or divert the upset.

It was somehow also “leaked” that the French government had been spying on its own population, followed by allegations that the German government had known about and even used information obtained by US-connected spies. The truth of these “mitigating” leaks was, however, less clear.

As expected, such efforts at damage control had a very limited effect. The harm perpetrated by US-led spying on the trust, goodwill and relations with Europe was far more serious, and remains a main feature in the foreground.

In Latin America “south of the border”, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico and Venezuela are particularly disturbed by US-led spying activities. Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Paraguay and Uruguay are also concerned.

Several of these countries have already offered asylum to Snowden, who hopes to avoid prosecution in the US after his current one-year asylum stay in Russia. The more Washington pressures and threatens these countries, the more keen they are to protect whistleblowers like Snowden.

The Union of South American Nations (Unasur) is currently working on a new, alternative communications system that will cut the prospect of US spying in the region. As a sign of seriousness, the region’s defence ministers who form Unasur’s defence council are tasked with developing the new system.

Unasur’s 12 member countries may be disadvantaged in lacking sophisticated technological inputs for the system. However, they also enjoy certain advantages in a renewed unity, determination and strength of purpose.

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, whose email had been hacked by US spies, has accused Washington of violating human rights and crime. Four days ago, she followed this with a defence procurement contract that spelt out clearly where Brazil stood.

Capping a 10-year plan, Rousseff announced on Wednesday that Brazil would buy 36 of Sweden’s Saab Gripen fighter jets instead of Boeing’s F/A-18s in replacing the air force’s ageing fleet. Brazil had bargained the price down from US$6bil (RM19.8bil) to US$4.5bil (RM14.8bil).

US officials privately grumbled over having lost “a US$4bil deal” but in fact the cost of NSA spying on Brazil is almost twice that. Boeing’s price for the F/A-18s was US$7.5bil (RM24.7bil).

Over the longer term, the cost to the US economy is likely to grow if Washington does not or cannot seriously mend its ways. US-based companies like Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft are often seen by other countries as part of the problem in having to comply with US laws and demands.

Unasur is already showing the way forward by working on an alternative. In time, other regions like Europe and countries such as Russia, India and China may also develop their own communications systems and software, taking more business away from US companies.

In the short term it is always tempting to blame the messenger such as Edward Snowden rather than the problematic nature of the message itself. Ironically, the development of modern communications has raised awareness of privacy and sovereignty rights – and of their violations.

To level the playing field, IT development as well as spying activities may need to become more equalised. By serving the greater interests of the greater number, that would be democratisation indeed.

Contributed by Bunn Nagara, who is a Senior Fellow at the Institute of Strategic and International Studies (ISIS) Malaysia, The Star/Asia News Network

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