Kuala Lumpur, 4 March 2021 ( The Capital Post)- Perikatan Nasional has survived a year as the ruling government.
-Advertisement-
One will not deny that PN have taken charge of the nation at one of the darkest times in the history book where Covid-19 pandemic spreading globally and world economy is slowly crumbling.
Every ministry under the PN coalition had to come up with respective strategies to keep the lives and livelihoods of people in balance.
One of the ministries under the deep water was the Ministry of Human Resource which was led by Datuk Seri M Saravanan since 10th March 2020.
Skills development, labor, workplace safety and health, trade unions, industrial relations, industrial court, labour market research, and social security are only a few of the responsibilities that the ministry has, and these responsibilities are increasing with each new dimension added as human resource roles evolve with time and technology.
Saravanan had to come up with strategies to keep the balance between lives and livelihoods.
The MP of Tapah made a bold statement on 27 March 2020, that every employer must pay full salary to employees despite the Movement Control Order (MCO) and employees should not be asked to take annual leave.
He also introduced Wage Subsidy Programme through the Social Security Organization (SOCSO) by the Human Resource Ministry which vastly protected the welfare of employees.
Till date as reported there have been RM13.53 Bil channelled through the Wage subsidy programme.
To create a balance between the heavy responsibility of employers to pay employees salary, Saravanan came up with an initiative on March 31 2020, when the Human Resources Development Fund (HRDF) granted levy exemption to more than 30,000 of its registered employers for six months, beginning April.
Amid the Covid-19 outbreak and many employees retrenched from work, as a Human Resource Minister Saravanan taken the measure to launch PENJANA HRDF or National Economic Recovery Plan to emphasizes training in terms of reskilling and upskilling of Malaysians to enhance the employability of the unemployed and these efforts implemented through collaborations with various ministries and agencies.
-Advertisement-
Deals have been sealed by Saravanan with The National Tech Association of Malaysia (PIKOM), Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB), 7-Eleven, AEON and many other agencies and corporations to offer job opportunities.
When things were slowly recovering in mid of last year, a third wave of pandemic hit Malaysia and this time many clusters were from work places.
Necessary measure were taken by Ministry of Health and Ministry of Human Resource to curb the disease among workforce such as making it necessary for workers to go through Covid-19 screening, subsidies the cost of screening for employers, and Saravanan also made numerous visit to industrial and construction sectors to ensure employers adhering to the Workers’ Minimum Standards of Housing and Amenities Act (Act 446).
A total of 30,997 workers insured under the Social Security Organization (Socso) out of over 100,000 who were laid off, have been successfully relocated in the employment sector as per reported in December and another 93,204 individuals were relocated through the hiring incentive programme.
He also has set up a Special Task Force Committee to develop a comprehensive database of Malaysian workers in Singapore to identify strategies and action plans to help those affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Most recently, Datuk Seri M Saravanan’s Ministry of Human Resource and GO1 one of the largest international e-learning aggregators, came up with an e-Latih app.
e-Latih app benefits Malaysians with free access to more than 200 industry-driven training courses customized to the needs of the Malaysian industry.
Saravanan also instructed HRDF to increase the content to be uploaded to the e-LATiH platform every week besides adding content in Bahasa Malaysia and other languages.
He has managed the ministry well which reflects on the dip in the unemployment rate from 5.3% in May 2020 to 4.8% in Dec 2020.
In an interview with a news agency he said, “I want to be judged for the ministry’s achievements, especially acts of service and standards of excellence as part of their job”.
During the opening ceremony of Karnival Penjana Kerjaya Kebangsaan, he stated that 161,603 people had secured various jobs through the Social Security Organization’s (Socso) and MyFutureJobs website last year and through the carnival, 78 companies including multinational companies were featured with over 10,800 job offers up for grab.- The Capital Post