Reza Mahmud :
A significant number of Bangladeshi migrants are grappling with unemployment after moving abroad for work, particularly to the Middle East and Malaysia, despite having invested substantial amounts of money.
This situation has led to severe hardships for these individuals and their families back home, causing not only personal but also national financial losses through the expenditure on visas and related costs, rather than generating expected remittances.
Reports indicate that around 150,000 Bangladeshi workers have become jobless in Malaysia, a country that welcomed approximately 400,000 workers after its labour market reopened in August 2022. Mansur Hossain, hailing from Kushtia, represents one such case.
After arriving in Malaysia in December 2023 with an investment of about 5 lakh taka, Mansur found himself without a job or even a place to stay, forcing him to seek work on the streets and struggle for adequate food.
Mansur’s story is not unique; thousands of Bangladeshis in Malaysia are in similar straits, with some even living in jungles under precarious conditions.
Comparable dire situations are reported from several Middle Eastern countries, where Bangladeshi migrants are enduring hardships due to unemployment.
For instance, Shamim Ahmed, a 26-year-old from Faridpur, went to Saudi Arabia in 2021 but failed to secure employment.
After three years of struggle, he returned home empty-handed, facing a financial crisis due to the debt incurred for his migration.
The plight of these workers is often attributed to deceptive recruitment practices.
Agents and labor attachés have been accused of corruption, involving the sale of excess visas and promises of non-existent jobs.
This has led to situations where, for example, ten workers are sent for five available positions, leaving half of them unemployed upon arrival.
Similar plight of migrant workers persists in Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain and some other Middle Eastern countries due to corruption of Bangladesh missions abroad.
On condition of anonymity, a proprietor of a recruiting agency said that labour attachés’ and agents’ corruption are mostly responsible for the perilous conditions of migrants abroad.
The proprietor said middlemen who used to work as agents for the recruiting agencies are involved in corruption over visa selling.
“The Labour Attaché also takes money from those agents favouring such corruption,” the proprietor said.
The Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies (BAIRA) and government officials acknowledge these challenges.
Mohammed Fakhrul Islam, Joint Secretary General-1, BAIRA, points to the role of mega companies and contracting firms that overestimate their labour needs, resulting in a surplus of workers who end up being jobless.
“Mega companies and contracting companies which used to bring visas from the government showing demands of numbers of workers are mostly responsible for labourers’ unemployment conditions,” he said, adding that Labour Attachés of those countries should scrutinise the visas before approval. Besides, authorities concerned of those countries should have responsibility to their end.
Fakhrul Islam also said, “For example, they need 100 workers, but brought 200 visas in weak assumptions of their needs of manpower. In most cases the extra workers become unemployed after arriving in the country.”
The Bureau of Manpower, Employment, and Training (BMET) has been addressing these issues, having settled about 900 of the 2,500 complaints received last year and securing around Tk five crore in compensation.
However, despite efforts to penalize recruiting agencies and calls for greater scrutiny of visa approvals, the problems persist, exacerbated by a reported shortage of manpower in diplomatic missions abroad.
Mohammad Abdul Hai, Deputy Secretary and Director (Employment) of Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training (BMET), the Ministry of Expatriates’ Welfare & Overseas Employment told The New Nation on Thursday, “It is certain that a number of our migrants become unemployed after arriving in different countries.
We are punishing the number of recruiting agencies that send those workers.” “The BMET also realises crores of taka as compensations from those agencies,” he said.
To combat this crisis, recommendations have been made to identify and penalize companies involved in selling extra or fake visas and to permanently block such entities from hiring Bangladeshi manpower.
These measures aim to protect potential migrants from falling into similar traps in the future.
He said, “The ministry’s officials have recommended identifying those host companies which sell extra or fake visas and put them to justice in their country.”
