KUALA LUMPUR: Immigration Department will show no more mercy to employers who are found hiring illegal immigrants.
Its director-general Datuk Mustafa Ibrahim said the department has decided to stop issuing compound to those found having illegal immigrants in their payroll.
Instead, the department will start dragging each of the errant bosses to court, where they will have to face the brunt force of Section 55 of the Immigration Act.
Speaking to reporters after a massive raid in Cheras here early morning today, Mustafa said the department's leniency had been mistaken for weakness.
He said compounds issued by the department are taken as a mere slap on the wrist, and not as a deterrent factor.
"For this year, to date, Immigration Department has taken action against 325 employers for harbouring illegal immigrants.
"However, we have seen that the issuance of compound to these employers is not working, as they are willing to pay and it doesn't stop them from committing the offence.
"From now on, each and every employer we catch for hiring illegals, we will charge them in court," he said.
Mustafa said the department's enforcement arm had also been ordered to focus on hunting for errant employers, as this group is the root cause of the never ending problem of illegal immigrants’ presence in the country.
Under Section 55B of the Immigration Act 1959/63, any person found guilty for employing one or more illegal immigrants is liable to a maximum of RM50,000 fine, or jail for maximum 12 months, or both, for each such employee.
For those who are found guilty for hiring more than five illegal immigrants, they are also facing a minimum of six months jail, as well as liable to whipping of not more than six strokes of rotan.
On the raid, which was conducted at Desa Tun Razak Apartment, Mustafa said authorities performed checks on some 400 foreigners who live in 174 identified apartment units.
He said the joint-operation that saw some 100 personnel from the Immigration Department, Rela and National Registration Department deployed, was conducted after they received complaints from locals on the flats being infested by illegal immigrants.
As at 3am, the raiding party was still conducting checks on the immigrants' identities and travel documents.