600 rich Pakistanis opt for 2nd home scheme in Malaysia

About 600 Pakistanis have recently availed Malaysia My Second Home (MM2H) scheme that offers 10-year residency visa in the country. Interestingly from 2002 to April 2009, about 13,076 people from more than 100 countries all over the world opted for this scheme and Pakistan was at the 7th position in terms of the number of people who got the scheme. For a person below the age of 50 years, the Malaysian government has fixed $300,000 (Rs25.80 million) mandatory fixed-term deposit to provide 10 years residency visa.
However, for the person above the age of 50, the mandatory amount to be deposited into any Malaysian bank for a specific period is $150,000 (Rs12.90 million).
Malaysian Consul-General Muhammad Khalid Abdul Razak disclosed this in his farewell meeting with his media friends in Karachi on Wednesday.
Pakistanis should take maximum benefit from the MM2H scheme of Malaysia to explore tourism, business, investment and employment avenues there, he said. He also said that a staggering 24.5 million foreign tourists had visited Malaysia in 2010. “Our total population is just 27 million and the number of foreigners who visited Malaysia in 2010 is 24.5 million, very close to the total size of our population that is a big achievement,’’ he said.
This reflects the culture of tourism in Malaysia, he said, adding that last year 110,000 Pakistani tourists visited Malaysia. “I don’t take pride in claiming this that over 100,000 Pakistanis visited Malaysia in 2010. I will be happy when I will be told that a large number of Malaysians have visited Pakistan,” he added. Every Malaysian who had visited Karachi never said that he would not visit this city again, he said, adding that Pakistan government should make tourism attractive by improving the law and order situation.
“Malaysia had earned $14.5 billion through tourism in 2010 and our income from tourism alone is very close to total foreign exchange reserves of Pakistan, at $17.5 billion,” he said. He also pointed out that Malaysia ranked among top-10 investor countries in Pakistan. Malaysian gross investment from 2004-2007 stood at US$1 billion. Malaysia’s largest bank, Maybank, had bought 20 per cent stake in MCB Bank in 2008 with an investment of $800 million which was the largest-ever private sector cross-border investment in Pakistan. This investment is now valued at $950 million.
Razak said that under the Free Trade Agreement (FTA), Malaysia is offering 15 per cent tariff discount on the export of palm oil to Pakistan, an incentive that is not being given to any other country in the world. He regretted that Pakistan was getting nothing from a global trade volume of about $2 trillion of Halal products.
The European Union, UK, US and other countries invest billions of dollars on the import of Halal products and Pakistan’s share in this trade was zero.
Malaysia and Thailand have increased their penetration into the global Halal markets, but a country like Pakistan with a huge population of 180 million and a livestock population of 150 million of livestock was getting nothing, he said. Being a Muslim country, Pakistan must get the advantage of producing Halal products, he said, adding that Malaysia is providing technical support to Pakistan to promote certification and production of Halal products.