Kuala Lumpur – Malaysian manufacturers Monday urged the government to allow the employment of Indonesian women workers amid a recent ban on the intake of Indonesian workers.

The Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers in a statement said it supported the ban which was imposed after recent rioting by Indonesian workers here and a new policy to diversify sources of foreign labour.

But it called for female Indonesians to be excluded from the ban. "This is because the manufacturing sector employs a large number of female workers from Indonesia. In addition, recruiting female workers from other source countries may meet with problems as the supply of female manpower in those countries may not be forthcoming," it said.

The federation suggested that the government implement its new policy of limiting Indonesian workers gradually so that production schedules were not disrupted in the process.

Although preference was given to locals, it said the manufacturing sector still depended heavily on foreign workers as Malaysians were not interested in certain jobs in the industry.

It urged its members to expedite measures to cut dependence on foreign workers and called for stricter measures against illegal immigrants and against employers who hire them.

Reports over the weekend said the government planned to halve the number of registered Indonesian workers here to prevent a repeat of recent riots.

But home ministry secretary-general Aseh Che Mat clarified Monday that Indonesians would be made the last choice in the intake of foreign labour so that their number would be reduced, but not by half as reported.

He was quoted by Bernama news agency as saying that Indonesians now make-up 566,983 out of a total of 769,566 legal foreign workers in the country.

Apart from Indonesia, foreign workers have been traditionally recruited from Cambodia, Myanmar, Nepal, the Philippines and Thailand, while Laos and Vietnam are the latest sources.

Malaysia was angered by a riot by 400 Indonesian textile workers at their factory over drug tests on January 17, and has said it would give priority to workers from other countries.

The factory riot was followed three days later with a rampage by more than 70 Indonesian construction workers armed with machetes at Cyberjaya, a high-tech suburb south of Kuala Lumpur.

Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad has said Malaysia did not need to take in any more Indonesians as the country already had a surplus of foreign workers.

Labour experts in Indonesia on Monday expressed fears that Malaysia's blacklisting of its workers would worsen Jakarta's already acute unemployment crisis.