Streamlining operations of manpower recruiting agents
Saturday, 29 September 2007
Ripan Kumar Biswas from New York
I met him at Seoul, South Korea. He is Ehsan, a 27-year old Bangladeshi young man. His face was burnt as because he used to work with acid in a mobile phone's key pad-making factory from dawn to midnight. As he had a dream to open a business in Bangladesh, he used to send every single penny he saved to his home without caring about his health.
I had a chance to read how the South Korean economy is advancing day by day. The economy of South Korea is the third largest in Asia and the twelfth largest in the world in terms of nominal gross domestic product (GDP) as of 2006. Besides some other nominal differences, modern South Korea and young Koreans in particular always pay their homage to their fathers and forefathers as the backbone of this rising economy is only the hard labour and the respect towards the labour that the Koreans show at home and abroad.
Since 1976 to April 2007, around 4.751 million Bangladeshis went across the globe and their remittance of funds is now the main earning source of Bangladesh. With a continuous growth, Bangladesh's remittance inflow reached US dollar 561.92 million in May 2007. The non-resident Bangladeshis send roughly $7.0 billion every year and a significant amount of the total amount still comes through 'Hundi'.
Every Bangladeshi felt proud and welcomed the members of the Bangladesh cricket team when they beat the West Indies in the Twenty20 World Cup on September 13, 2007. Bangladesh roared to victory by six wickets in their group match. No doubt that was a glorious moment for every Bangladeshi, but how many of them are aware of the terrible situation that Bangladeshi workers were facing at the same time in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia?
According to the reports in the media, the Bangladeshi workers who had been on a hunger strike for five days on the premises of the office of the Bangladesh High Commission in Kuala Lumpur due to being not paid for six months and being fed only one meal a day following a wage dispute, were attacked and assaulted by the local law enforcers, recruiting agencies and allegedly even by the officials of High Commission on September 14, 2007.
In addition, hundreds of Bangladeshi workers were forced to camp in the parking lot of the international airport in Kuala Lumpur for days as they waited for their employers to pick them up, but nobody showed up because of lack of communication between the recruiting agents in Dhaka and the employers there.
In the recent days in the aftermath of such serial incidents, Bangladeshis at home and abroad, human rights organisations and the well-wishers of Bangladeshi workers expressed their strong reaction against the concerned authorities for not paying respect and meting out ill-treatment towards Bangladeshi workers. People welcomed the Bangladesh government's attention, reaction and their initiative on this account.
But the question is: why should not those workers be treated well by the Bangladeshi authorities, respective recruiters or the host country?
Although Bangladesh's remittance inflow is the man fuel of the country's economy, but the awful plight of thousands of Bangladeshi workers in many parts of the world is extremely worrying for everyone. The Malaysian incident is just only a token example.
While despatching a team to probe the plight of 100-plus workers in Malaysia who were allegedly duped and stranded, Bangladesh also lodged a strong protest with the government in Malaysia. The relations between Bangladesh and Malaysia are friendly. Malaysia is an important market for Bangladeshi expatriates. Business ties between the two countries have also been expanding.
As market in Malaysia has already been saturated and the Malaysian companies are on the lookout for outside markets to spread their wings, they have become the sixth-largest foreign investor in Bangladesh with $1.37bn investments made so far. Of the amount, $513 million has been invested under Aktel in the country's booming cell phone sector, followed by the power sector.
In 2006, Malaysia's export to Bangladesh was worth $424.24 million against a paltry $22.92 million import from Bangladesh. Private investment proposals from as many as 50 Malaysian companies have been registered to date with the Board of Investment in Bangladesh.
In addition, Malaysia has offered to invest $1.2bn in Bangladesh to build a 198km highway from Dhaka to Chittagong to open a second land route for easier transportation between the capital and the port city. The Bangladesh Bank was reported to have awarded a contract to a Malaysian company to supply 300 million pieces of five-taka metal coin on January 31, 2007.
Instead of attaching the highest priority to the welfare of the non- resident Bangladeshis overseas, most of the Bangladeshi diplomatic missions do hardly take care of them in times of their difficulties and consider them as a problem for the country rather than an asset. This uncaring attitude of the Bangladeshi missions also encourages the agencies and respective authorities in the host countries to ignore the workers and their rights.
The current practice of outsourcing has the elements of trafficking in persons. Workers are brought, their passports are taken away, they are held in captivity, beaten and abused with no employment.
Many Bangladeshi workers always find a difference between what they are promised, and what they actually get in the host countries. Sometimes, they have to sign a new agreement where salaries are lower than the promised ones, and other facilities stated in the original contracts are not honoured. Some cases are found in which recruitment agencies provided workers with work permits to work in companies that did not exist at all, and therefore were deported from airport, or sent to detention centers. As a result, they are prone to agents' and employers' exploitation.
Past governments and related authorities have also been involved in overseas employment-related scams, being party to the irregularities that leave country's workers, who spend large amounts of money to go abroad for employment, with no employment and no legal right to remain in those countries, once they get there.
Malaysia is an "economic tiger" in Asia. Bangladesh also needs to augment its remittance inflow. As such, both countries should take a pro-active approach to address the issues of their common concerns in order to consolidate solid friendship and mutual cooperation which are important for safeguarding their mutual economic interest.
However, Malaysia assured Bangladesh of investigating the problems being faced by Bangladeshi job seekers in Kuala Lumpur and would, as the reports said, take stern actions against the Malaysian company PTC Asia-Pacific for its failure to provide appropriate jobs and facilities to the Bangladeshi workers whom it recruited.
Meanwhile, those unfortunate Bangladeshi workers in Malaysia will return to their home within next 15 days with empty hand following a negotiation that was reportedly finalised between the concerned authorities of Bangladesh and Malaysia. But the whole incident should have been dealt with, more seriously.
Meanwhile, the authorities in Bangladesh should enforce strict regulations with regard to manpower recruiting agencies. Such agencies must comply with those regulations. Most of the sufferings of the "recruited" Bangladeshi workers for overseas jobs start with the recruiting agencies. The issues concerning the Bangladeshi migrant workers do need to be addressed seriously, by tackling the problems at their root.
I met him at Seoul, South Korea. He is Ehsan, a 27-year old Bangladeshi young man. His face was burnt as because he used to work with acid in a mobile phone's key pad-making factory from dawn to midnight. As he had a dream to open a business in Bangladesh, he used to send every single penny he saved to his home without caring about his health.
I had a chance to read how the South Korean economy is advancing day by day. The economy of South Korea is the third largest in Asia and the twelfth largest in the world in terms of nominal gross domestic product (GDP) as of 2006. Besides some other nominal differences, modern South Korea and young Koreans in particular always pay their homage to their fathers and forefathers as the backbone of this rising economy is only the hard labour and the respect towards the labour that the Koreans show at home and abroad.
Since 1976 to April 2007, around 4.751 million Bangladeshis went across the globe and their remittance of funds is now the main earning source of Bangladesh. With a continuous growth, Bangladesh's remittance inflow reached US dollar 561.92 million in May 2007. The non-resident Bangladeshis send roughly $7.0 billion every year and a significant amount of the total amount still comes through 'Hundi'.
Every Bangladeshi felt proud and welcomed the members of the Bangladesh cricket team when they beat the West Indies in the Twenty20 World Cup on September 13, 2007. Bangladesh roared to victory by six wickets in their group match. No doubt that was a glorious moment for every Bangladeshi, but how many of them are aware of the terrible situation that Bangladeshi workers were facing at the same time in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia?
According to the reports in the media, the Bangladeshi workers who had been on a hunger strike for five days on the premises of the office of the Bangladesh High Commission in Kuala Lumpur due to being not paid for six months and being fed only one meal a day following a wage dispute, were attacked and assaulted by the local law enforcers, recruiting agencies and allegedly even by the officials of High Commission on September 14, 2007.
In addition, hundreds of Bangladeshi workers were forced to camp in the parking lot of the international airport in Kuala Lumpur for days as they waited for their employers to pick them up, but nobody showed up because of lack of communication between the recruiting agents in Dhaka and the employers there.
In the recent days in the aftermath of such serial incidents, Bangladeshis at home and abroad, human rights organisations and the well-wishers of Bangladeshi workers expressed their strong reaction against the concerned authorities for not paying respect and meting out ill-treatment towards Bangladeshi workers. People welcomed the Bangladesh government's attention, reaction and their initiative on this account.
But the question is: why should not those workers be treated well by the Bangladeshi authorities, respective recruiters or the host country?
Although Bangladesh's remittance inflow is the man fuel of the country's economy, but the awful plight of thousands of Bangladeshi workers in many parts of the world is extremely worrying for everyone. The Malaysian incident is just only a token example.
While despatching a team to probe the plight of 100-plus workers in Malaysia who were allegedly duped and stranded, Bangladesh also lodged a strong protest with the government in Malaysia. The relations between Bangladesh and Malaysia are friendly. Malaysia is an important market for Bangladeshi expatriates. Business ties between the two countries have also been expanding.
As market in Malaysia has already been saturated and the Malaysian companies are on the lookout for outside markets to spread their wings, they have become the sixth-largest foreign investor in Bangladesh with $1.37bn investments made so far. Of the amount, $513 million has been invested under Aktel in the country's booming cell phone sector, followed by the power sector.
In 2006, Malaysia's export to Bangladesh was worth $424.24 million against a paltry $22.92 million import from Bangladesh. Private investment proposals from as many as 50 Malaysian companies have been registered to date with the Board of Investment in Bangladesh.
In addition, Malaysia has offered to invest $1.2bn in Bangladesh to build a 198km highway from Dhaka to Chittagong to open a second land route for easier transportation between the capital and the port city. The Bangladesh Bank was reported to have awarded a contract to a Malaysian company to supply 300 million pieces of five-taka metal coin on January 31, 2007.
Instead of attaching the highest priority to the welfare of the non- resident Bangladeshis overseas, most of the Bangladeshi diplomatic missions do hardly take care of them in times of their difficulties and consider them as a problem for the country rather than an asset. This uncaring attitude of the Bangladeshi missions also encourages the agencies and respective authorities in the host countries to ignore the workers and their rights.
The current practice of outsourcing has the elements of trafficking in persons. Workers are brought, their passports are taken away, they are held in captivity, beaten and abused with no employment.
Many Bangladeshi workers always find a difference between what they are promised, and what they actually get in the host countries. Sometimes, they have to sign a new agreement where salaries are lower than the promised ones, and other facilities stated in the original contracts are not honoured. Some cases are found in which recruitment agencies provided workers with work permits to work in companies that did not exist at all, and therefore were deported from airport, or sent to detention centers. As a result, they are prone to agents' and employers' exploitation.
Past governments and related authorities have also been involved in overseas employment-related scams, being party to the irregularities that leave country's workers, who spend large amounts of money to go abroad for employment, with no employment and no legal right to remain in those countries, once they get there.
Malaysia is an "economic tiger" in Asia. Bangladesh also needs to augment its remittance inflow. As such, both countries should take a pro-active approach to address the issues of their common concerns in order to consolidate solid friendship and mutual cooperation which are important for safeguarding their mutual economic interest.
However, Malaysia assured Bangladesh of investigating the problems being faced by Bangladeshi job seekers in Kuala Lumpur and would, as the reports said, take stern actions against the Malaysian company PTC Asia-Pacific for its failure to provide appropriate jobs and facilities to the Bangladeshi workers whom it recruited.
Meanwhile, those unfortunate Bangladeshi workers in Malaysia will return to their home within next 15 days with empty hand following a negotiation that was reportedly finalised between the concerned authorities of Bangladesh and Malaysia. But the whole incident should have been dealt with, more seriously.
Meanwhile, the authorities in Bangladesh should enforce strict regulations with regard to manpower recruiting agencies. Such agencies must comply with those regulations. Most of the sufferings of the "recruited" Bangladeshi workers for overseas jobs start with the recruiting agencies. The issues concerning the Bangladeshi migrant workers do need to be addressed seriously, by tackling the problems at their root.