Some of them had been warned by their loved ones against taking up the job offers that seemed too good to be true, while one man worked in Dubai for three weeks before being sent to Cambodia.
Nor Azlinda, 50, said her 22-year old son was duped into working as a customer service representative in Dubai in April, but was “transferred” to Cambodia under the pretext that the company in the UAE had gone bankrupt.
She told a press conference at Wisma MCA that her son texted her from Cambodia, telling her that there were six other victims – five Chinese and one Malay – with him.
Azlinda said she was informed that the other Malay victim was a 23-year-old from Kedah, known only as Siti.
She claimed her son was asked to do a Macau scam job in Cambodia with no off days given in order to achieve a certain target. She said the syndicate threatened to “sell” him to another agent in October if he failed to meet the target.
Another woman, who asked to be identified only as Chong, said she had told her 35-year-old husband not to accept a job offer in Cambodia two weeks ago.
“My husband told me not to worry and said nothing will happen to him. So he went to Cambodia via Singapore about two weeks ago.
“Three days ago, he called me to seek help from the Malaysian embassy in Cambodia as he has been held captive there,” she said.
Another mother, Tiong, believed her son was being held captive by a job scam syndicate in Cambodia. Earlier this month, she had advised him against accepting a job offer there, fearing it would turn out to be a scam.
“He then said he was going for a holiday in Taiwan. I dropped him off at the airport last week but I have not been able to contact him until now,” she said.
The aunt of another victim, who identified herself as Yap, said her nephew had been held by a syndicate in Laos for three years now.
She said the syndicate had asked the family to pay RM113,000 in ransom for his release, and that her nephew would work 12 hours a day, and sometimes for an extra two hours, if he failed to meet the target.
“He had been sold to other syndicates four times in Laos,” she claimed.
MCA public services and complaints department chief Michael Chong said it had received reports of 114 job scams and lodged 76 police reports.
He said 54 victims were taken to Cambodia, 29 to Myanmar and 11 to Laos, and 93 of the 114 cases involved men.
“Only 30 victims have returned, so our success rate is actually less than 30%. What saddens me is that while some have returned home safely, more victims are being conned,” he said.