UAE-Malaysia bond getting stronger
DUBAI — Bilateral ties between the UAE and Malaysia are getting stronger and the two countries are exploring new areas in business and human relations, Malaysian consulgeneral Yubazlan Yusof said on the occasion of Malaysia’s 59th Independence Day on Wednesday.
The UAE is home to around 7,000 Malaysian expats, with nearly 4,000 of them living and working in Dubai as engineers, pilots, academicians, businessmen, and other professionals, the diplomat said.
Yusof said: “We really don’t have blue-collar workers here. Although, over the past couple of years, we’ve seen a decline in the number of Malaysian professionals due to the declining oil and gas sector in the region.
“But we are looking beyond the post-oil scenario. There are many opportunities to explore and Dubai is popular not because of oil and gas but for services and tourism. As for us, we are trying to bring more Malaysian agricultural products here in the UAE.”
The Malaysian diplomat said the UAE continues to be an important trading partner for Malaysia, its 15th largest in fact, and also its 13th largest import source and 16th largest export destination.
“The UAE is our largest trading partner in the GCC. Over a decade, our bilateral trade has increased by 86.07 per cent to $6.14 billion in 2015 from $3.30 billion in 2006.
For the first half of the year, bilateral trade between both countries was valued at $2.76 billion, comprising Malaysian exports worth $1.59 billion and total imports from the UAE worth $1.17 billion.”
Some members of the Malaysian expat community gathered at the consul-general’s house in Al Barsha on Tuesday night to celebrate Hari Merdeka (Malaysian for Independence Day), which was declared on August 31, 1957, ending British colonial rule.
The simple celebration was graced by Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia, speaker of the House of Representatives of the Malaysian Parliament, who made a stopover in Dubai after his official visit to Iran.
Mulia called on his Malaysian compatriots to continue respecting the culture of their host country and, at the same time, not to forget their own country.
“Remember your roots; do not forget your country and continue to be Sehati, Sejiwa (One Heart, One Soul) – this year’s Independence Day theme. Our country is multi-racial, multi-cultural and multi-religious and we always take pride in behaving as one although our backgrounds are diverse,” Mulia said.
Besides the Malaysia Independence Day, the country will have another national holiday on September 16 called Hari Malaysia (Malaysia Day) to commemorate the formation of Malaysia in 1963, when North Borneo, Sarawak, and Singapore joined the existing states of the Federation of Malaya.