The government is considering an alternative arrangement to ensure issuance of MRPs (machine readable passports) to around 3.5 million expatriate Bangladeshis due to poor delivery performance of the outsourcing company.
Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment (EWOE) minister Khandker Mosharraf Hossain said this on Thursday at a press briefing after the meeting of advisory committee on issuing MRP at the city's Probashi Kallyan Bhaban.
Malaysian outsourcing company IRIS Corporation Berhad was appointed to enroll expatriate workers for issuance of MRPs.
Earlier, an advisory committee meeting decided to enroll 9,000 expatriates in Saudi Arabia, and 5,000 in the UAE and Malaysia. But the number of enrolment is still insignificant.
The other committee member Foreign Affairs minister Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali and Home Affairs state minister Asaduzzaman Khan were also present at the press conference.
"I am not satisfied over the performance of the outsourcing company," said the EWOE minister adding that if the company's performance is not improved, they will take alternative initiatives to issue passport before deadline.
To make the MRP issuance programme faster, the committee asked the director general of passport to form a work programme and a monitoring committee.
The minister expressed hope that they would be able to issue MRP to at least 95 per cent of migrant workers within the deadline.
After November 25, manual passports will not be accepted by any countries, as per declaration by International Civil Aviation Organisation.
Officials, however, said many workers refuse to go to IRIS application processing centres (APC) in Malaysia for enrolment as most of those are in remote areas. Besides, the company is yet to introduce a mobile team which will enroll the workers at their workplaces.
Nearly 9.0 million Bangladeshis are working in160 countries. Of them 6.0 million have already got MRPs. The EWOE secretary Khandakar Iftekhar Haidar, among others, was present at the press meet.
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