Socso: Extra 180,000 job placements, 2.5 million jobs saved under Pemulih

PETALING JAYA: The Social Security Organisations (Socso) is set to conduct 180,000 job placements and keep 2.5 million people on their jobs until December this year under the recently-announced Pemulih aid package.

Socso CEO Datuk Seri Dr Mohammed Azman Aziz Mohammed said this is in addition to the 180,449 job placements that took place from January till July 5 this year through the government’s MyFuture Jobs and Hiring Incentive Programme.

“To ensure more job placements among job seekers, Socso will continue and organise more programmes to create and offer jobs under Pemulih that will start by July 15,” he said at an online press conference here Tuesday (July 6).

Mohammed Azman noted that Socso has conducted 1,168 online job interview programmes so far this year, while another 950 sessions will roll out either online and physically until the end of the year.

He also called on job seekers to utilise the Job Search Allowance (Elaun Mencari Pekerjaan) that will be opened for non-contributors such as fresh graduates, school graduates and gig economy workers this time around.

“There are more than 231,000 vacancies on the MyFuture Jobs portal. To encourage job-seeking among workers who are non-Socso contributors, they will get an allowance of RM300 when they attend three interviews a month for two months,” said Mohammed Azman.

“They will also receive another RM400 once hired. This will benefit 229,000 job seekers who have registered on the portal,” he added.

He noted that the KerjayaGig Incentive has also been improved by widening the scope of the recruitment that will include gig or temporary jobs workers, covering those who have been retrenched, ordered to go on non-paid leave and persons with disability on temporary jobs or gig works while waiting for permanent employment.

“Given the high unemployment rate among youth, the Pemulih package has also expanded the KerjayaGig incentive to unemployed graduates. Under the scheme, self-employed individuals will get RM600 a month for six months if they work a minimum of 10 hours a week, while the employer who hires them will receive a one-off RM200 for each employee,” he said.

Under Pemulih, Socso has allocated RM3.8bil through its Wage Subsidy Programme 4.0 initiative that would benefit 2.5 million employees nationwide.