Senior Minister for Security Ismail Sabri Yaakob said Putrajaya had made such tests mandatory due to concerns of a new cluster involving foreign workers.

“We want to prevent this. We do not want a situation like that of our neighbour Singapore.

“For a long time, its Covid-19 cases were quite stagnant but because of a cluster involving foreign workers, in the end, Singapore witnessed a spike. We don’t want that to happen to our country,” he said at his daily briefing here.

It was reported last month that foreign workers living in the city-state were the main force behind its spike in infections.

Singapore has recorded over 18,000 positive cases to date.

Yesterday, Ismail announced that all foreign workers must undergo a swab test following a spike in Covid-19 cases among them in Ampang, beginning with those in Selangor and Kuala Lumpur.

The Malaysian Employers Federation (MEF) had criticised the directive, with its executive director Shamsuddin Bardan telling FMT that employers could end up spending up to RM1 billion.

He said the directive was an “overkill” that could cause a logistical nightmare as there are some 2.3 million documented foreign workers in the country.

But Ismail said MEF should understand that Putrajaya was acting in the best interest of all.

He said if many employees at a company tested positive for the virus, the government would shut down the business premise or factory concerned.

He added that it would be better for foreign workers to be screened so that authorities could isolate and treat those who test positive for Covid-19 while those who are uninfected continue to work.

“This way, their operations will continue,” he said.

He also said that foreign workers in the construction sector would be screened first.

He said Socso would bear the cost of their swab tests as 60% of these workers were Socso contributors.

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