An estimated 10 lakh Bangladeshi workers could not avail overseas jobs in the outgoing year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Of them, 3.26 lakh expatriate workers have returned home since April after losing jobs, some 5.5 lakh people who were expecting to go abroad through normal processes could not find jobs while nearly 1.5 lakh others who came home on vacation could not return to their workplaces.
Amid this situation Bangladesh celebrated International Migrants Day on Friday with the call: Mujibbarsher ahban, dokkho hoye bidesh jan (Mujib Year asks you to go abroad for jobs with requisite skills).
Expatriates’ welfare and overseas employment minister Imran Ahmad at a press conference at his office on the occasion on the day said that the overseas employment sector of Bangladesh was the worst-affected sector due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Over 10 million Bangladeshi migrants employed in 173 countries around the world in 2019 sent home approximately $18.35 billion in remittance, which was 40 per cent of the country’s total foreign exchange reserve, according to manpower bureau data.
The minister said that they received demand for only 12,800 workers from two countries — 12,000 garment workers from Jordan and 800 others from Saudi Arabia.
The government does not have the specific number of migrants who have come back from destination countries and how many are still stranded, he said.
‘We depend on NGOs and newspapers for statistics,’ he further said.
Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training officials said that last year 1,944 workers, on average, went abroad daily with jobs, mostly in the Middle East, but now daily over 2,700 workers on average were returning home.
Shariful Hasan, migration programme head of the non-government organisation BRAC, said that many workers were waiting to go back, too.
He advised that the government should prepare skilled manpower according to market demand and explore new destinations for the huge number of job seekers.
Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies general secretary Shameem Ahmed Chowdhury Noman said that about two lakh people, who had completed all formalities but could not fly for their job destinations at the eleventh hour in March, April and May due to the pandemic, started leaving while the fresh demand for workers was very low.
He said that this year some five lakh Bangladeshi workers failed to leave for their destination countries due to the coronavirus crisis.
‘We have no statistics on the demand but the overseas job market is gradually opening, though the response is very low,’ he said.
There would be, he went on, a very large number of overseas jobs shortly in healthcare, elderly care and childcare services.
He sought a pro-active role of the Bangladeshi missions in the countries concerned to take a full advantage of the situation.
Meanwhile, several thousand Bangladeshi workers in Lebanon have recently demonstrated for taking them back home as they have lost jobs and are living a difficult life in the war-ravaged country.
Overseas employment ministry secretary Ahmed Munirus Saleheen said that the government was under pressure to bring back the stranded workers from Lebanon.
‘We have decided to bring back the workers in phases,’ he told the press conference.
Some 1.5 lakh Bangladeshi migrants are working in Lebanon and they are passing a very miserable life there due to job loss and wage cut amid inflation and the coronavirus pandemic, according to news reports.
Migration experts suggested that the Bangladesh government should make serious efforts to stop them from returning by finding new job market for them.
The minister said that the government could reintegrate workers by providing them loans and skill-based training and it was working to this end.
Aminul Islam, 40, who returned from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in March, alleged that he failed to obtain loan from the government even after repeated attempts.
The secretary said that the ministry had earmarked a Tk 700 crore fund for returnee migrants but the loan distribution was not up to the mark as migrants did not come for loans due to lack of proper communication.
‘Only a total of 443 returnee migrants have taken Tk 18 crore loans from the Tk 700 crore fund,’ he disclosed.
Monir Khan, an inhabitant of Brahmanbaria who has come back from Malaysia, said that several hundred Bangladeshi workers coming on vacation from that country like him were waiting to go back but the government was indifferent in this regard.
Several thousand migrants who got stranded in the country due to the coronavirus pandemic demonstrated in front of the foreign ministry in November demanding a quick return to Malaysia.
Demonstrators said that there were more than 25,000 Malaysia-bound expatriates stranded in the country due to the pandemic.
Minister Imran said that the government continued talks with the Malaysian authorities over reopening the job market for Bangladeshis.
‘The job market remains closed not for us but for their political instability,’ he said.
The Malaysian government on several occasions has assured Bangladesh of reopening the labour market since September 2018, when the Southeast Asian country suspended recruiting Bangladeshi workers.
In early 2015, the governments of Bangladesh and Malaysia signed a memorandum of understanding on the recruitment of Bangladeshi workers under the G2G Plus mechanism.
The G2G Plus system, worked out by the two countries in 2016, collapsed due to wrongdoings of members belonging to a syndicate.
Over 10.50 lakh workers have so far migrated to Malaysia for work.
Bangladesh set a target to send 7.5 lakh workers abroad in 2020 as 7,00,159 workers were sent in 2019, 7,34,181 in 2018 and 10,08,525 were sent in 2017.
Migration experts said that as soon as the situation became normal the government should enforce a strict monitoring in order to stop irregular and costly migration.
About sending apparel workers to Jordan, officials said that all the selected RMG workers would go to that country through the government recruiting agency Bangladesh Overseas Employment and Services Limited free of cost.
The government would hold a migration fair to select the right candidates.
Bangladesh Migrant Workers Forum on Friday held a human chain in front of the National Press Club marking the day and demanded the implementation of the Overseas Employment and Migration Act 2013 to protect the rights of migrants.
