Govt justifies setting up of EGMS

KUALA LUMPUR: A company set up by the Education Ministry has dismissed claims by some private universities and colleges questioning its ability to operate as a one-stop centre to handle the enrolment of foreign students in the country.
Education Malaysia Global Services (EMGS) chief executive officer Mohd Yazid Abdul Hamid (pix) said that EMGS was set up in January last year to ensure that foreign students wanting to study locally were qualified and healthy. He added that the company does not receive any funding from the ministry and the RM1,000 fee it charges per student to process a visa application was to cover its operating costs.
In an interview with theSun, he said that, in the past, there was no centralised system to gather data of foreign students and visa applications were sent by universities and colleges directly to the ministry for clearance.
In this process, the government had to bear the cost, even in cases where foreign students were eventually disqualified due mainly to their academic qualifications and health status.
"We then did not have a centralised system to trace the background of applicants and therefore a situation arose where a student disqualified in the past could continue to reapply countless times. Before we came into the picture, some institutions were charging students fees from RM1,000 to RM5,000 to cover the visa application.
"EMGS has provided a better platform to manage foreign students as all their relevant data, such as results, class attendance and health status, were kept in a single database in both hard and soft copy. The data, which was previously kept by various relevant authorities before EMGS came into force, would be updated continuously until the students complete their studies," he said.
"Having such a data base is important for the government to keep track of these students to ensure they are here solely for the purpose of pursuing their studies. It is also in line with the government's target to achieve the status of Malaysia being an educational hub by 2020. Having students who under-perform will affect this aim," he added.
On students having to do their medical checkup in Malaysia, he said that this was necessary to ensure they do not have any contagious diseases.
He said last year, the applications of 18 students were rejected because they had AIDS or Hepatitis B, C and drug-related diseases.