KSA to resume hiring of Bangladeshis

Saudi Arabia has agreed to reopen its market for Bangladeshi workers shortly, expatriates' welfare and overseas employment minister Khandker Mosharraf Hossain said Sunday.
"They've decided to reopen its market for Bangladeshis. It's now a matter of formal announcement," the minister said after his visit to the oil-rich Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.  
He said Bangladeshis will be able to secure jobs in the Kingdom as low as Tk 15000 to Tk 20,000, if the employers bear visa, air fare and other key expenses.
Mr Hossain told reporters that Adel Fakeih, labour minister of Saudi Arabia assured him of resuming hiring workers sooner.
A Saudi delegation including technical experts will visit the country to discuss labour recruitment process, he said.
As per the Saudi law, if anyone engages with visa trading, they have to face 15 years of imprisonment, Saudi officials told the bilateral meeting.
Besides, Bangladesh and the KSA have agreed to form a joint consultative committee to discuss migration process and workers' welfare time to time.
The minister also said Bangladesh will send skilled workers. "We will not send unskilled workers there."  
Bangladesh is now providing training to 46 trades in technical training centres, he mentioned.
He also said nearly 2.2 million job seekers are enlisted under the government database; they also will get the opportunity to go to Saudi Arabia if they want. The workers who were registered for Malaysia, will also get the same chance.
Responding to a question, the minister said overseas job seekers will get Machine Readable Passport (MRP) in time. The Bangladeshis working in the KSA will not face any problem to get it.
After November 2015, manual passports will not be accepted by any countries as per the declaration by International Civil Aviation Organisation.
The KSA started manpower recruitment from Bangladesh in 1976. In that year it hired   only 217 Bangladeshis.  
During the 1997 and 2008, the kingdom recruited more than 100,000 a year from Bangladesh. But That figure began to decline following a restriction imposed by them. Now only about 10,000 get job a year
A total of 2.63 million Bangladeshis traveled to the oil-rich country with jobs from 1976 to 2014, the BMET data showed.
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