Raheed Ejaz
The government is set to take initiatives to grab the Libyan labour market before a construction boom, Khandakar Mosharraf Hossain, the labour and employment and expatriates’ welfare and overseas employment minister, said on Wednesday.
‘Libya is going to recruit about a million overseas workers in five years to implement its massive development plan and we want to cash in on the prospect of sending our people there,’ the minister said.
He said that the African nation would become Bangladesh’s major manpower export destination in coming years as the authorities there were eager to take significant number of Bangladeshis.
Replying to a query on the probable number of Bangladeshi nationals, who will be sent to Libya, Mosharraf said, ‘We hope to send at least several lakhs of workers in the coming years.’
The minister hinted that a high level delegation would visit Libya within a couple of months to start negotiation for exploring the huge potentials in the African country for employment of the Bangladeshi job seekers.
Abdul Matin Chowdhury, secretary of expatriates’ welfare and overseas employment ministry, told New Age on Friday that Bangladesh had sent a delegation to Libya in 2007 for making assessment of the labour market in that country and found a huge prospect for sending Bangladeshi workers.
‘The Libyan labour minister during his Dhaka visit last year said his country would recruit a large number of workers from Bangladesh, out of its total demand for about one million overseas workers, in next five years,’ he added.
About the modality of sending workers, Matin Chowdhury said, ‘As the Libyan authorities do not take foreign workers through government channel, Bangladeshi jobseekers will be recruited through the manpower recruiting agencies.’
Mosharraf Hossain informed that the government was likely to constitute a welfare committee, comprising Bangladeshi nationals living in abroad, especially for addressing the grievances of expatriates and properly utilising them for further expansion of the overseas job markets.
He said, ‘We want to address the expatriate workers’ problem quickly for boosting inflow of remittance and utilise their money for by investment in the country.’
The minister also said that he was planning to utilise the Bangladeshi expatriates in further exploration of the overseas job markets.
Apart from Libya, the government would also begin to explore job markets in Greece and some other east-European countries.
‘We have information that a good number of Greek nationals have started leaving homeland with a hope of changing their lot by staying in different west-European countries. So, we can take the opportunity of filling up that vacuum with Bangladeshi people,’ he said.
The minister added that there was a growing demand for female workers to take care of the aged persons in the east-European countries, where Bangladesh had a chance to send women jobseekers with proper training and sufficient level of proficiency in English language.
Officials at the expatriates’ welfare ministry said the government would focus on exploring new job markets as Middle-East countries, the major destinations for the job seekers, already started to become saturated for the Bangladeshi workers in recent years.
Dwelling on the issue of sending manpower to Libya, an official of the ministry preferring anonymity said, ‘We have to ensure that Bangladeshi nationals will stay in Libya after reaching that country and will not cross the Mediterranean for seeking better future in the west-European countries.’
Around 5,000 Bangladeshis went to Libya in 2008 to work mainly in the construction sector of Libya.
Courtesy: newagebd.com
