November 29,2018
A bill has been proposed to a parliament to amend current immigration law of Maldives. Aim of this bill is to regulate illegal immigrant workers, and immigrant workers who change their employment without consent of current employer, and stop expat employees changing their employment within the contract period without knowledge of the employer. As per the amendment, anyone who help them to change their employment or the expat worker who found crossing the employment against the law will face one-year imprisonment or fine between MVR 500,000.00 to MVR 1,000,000.00. The bill was proposed by MP Mr. Moosa Maniku who is also sitting VP of parliament.
Further he says employers are now facing a lot of challenges and incur high cost to execute various projects as workers switch their employment so easily. Moreover, he highlighted the importance of this bill to reduce socio-economic impact of illegal workers. As per the bill, it will be effective from the day it is ratified by the president and published in government gazette.