PETALING JAYA: Negotiations on the RM800 salary proposal for domestic maids working here by the Indonesian government is still ongoing.

Human Resources Minister Datuk S. Subramaniam said his Indonesian counterparts had yet to finalise the matter with the ministry.

“Negotiations between both parties are still ongoing.

"I can’t say how long it will be before we resolve this issue, but it would not be solved until there is mutual agreement by both parties,” he told The Malay Mail yesterday.

Subramaniam was responding to yesterday’s statement by Malaysia's Ambassador to Indonesia Datuk Syed Munshe Afdzaruddin Syed Hassan who said the republic’s proposal of a RM800 minimum wage for Indonesian maids should be studied thoroughly.

Syed Munshe Afdzaruddin had said the government must consider the capacity of Malaysian employers to pay that kind of money and whether the salary was justified with the work they did.

“What the ambassador said is true. We have to study Indonesia’s proposal thoroughly before we can agree to anything.”

Last June, Indonesia froze the dispatch of Indonesian domestic maids to Malaysia, following cases of Indonesian domestic workers being ill-treated by their employers.

Indonesian Ambassador to Malaysia, Tan Sri Da'i Bachtiar SH, had said Jakarta would demand higher wages in its negotiations to lift the freeze.

Last month, The Malay Mail had reported that local employers were now hiring maids from other countries, mostly from Cambodia, followed by Vietnam and the Philippines.