Employers may hire them again as rebuilding of the war-ravaged country needs massive workforce
The Bangladeshi workers, who had to return from Libya due to a civil war early this year, might be hired again by their employers as part of efforts to rebuild the war-torn nation.
Foreign companies that had left the North African country amid fighting are also getting back there, and plan to re-employ their workers, said officials at the Bangladesh Embassy in Tripoli and the expatriates’ welfare and overseas employment ministry.
Labour Counsellor at the embassy Ahsan Kibria Siddiqui told The Daily Star over the phone, “For fresh recruitment, we will have to wait for the formation of Libyan cabinet.” But the returnees may not have to wait for long as some foreign companies have expressed willingness to re-employ them.
Some Italian companies have already returned to oil-rich Libya, and one of those, Bonatti, has informed the Bangladesh mission that it wanted to re-employ 38 returnees, he said.
In cases of re-employment, the companies will pay airfares of the workers, said Ahsan, who had talks with some of the companies.
The returnees will not have to make any payment for their re-employment, said the counsellor.
“We are in touch with the companies concerned. They prefer to recruit their former workers once they finalise things with the new authorities,” he said.
Nearly 38,000 Bangladeshis, mostly construction workers, returned following the conflicts in Libya. They include doctors, nurses and engineers.
Some companies sent back nearly 5,000 Bangladeshi workers while the government repatriated the others with the support of the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
Many of the workers returned home penniless as they were robbed in refugee camps or on their way to Egyptian or Tunisian borders while returning home. Many others had not received wages for months.
Taking loans from the World Bank, the government gave them Tk 50,000 each in aid while Brac, a non-governmental organisation, gave grants to more than 100 most affected returnees, and soft loans to some others for self-employment.
The IOM, which has developed a database on the returnees, said over 80 percent of them want to go abroad for jobs.
These returnees will be greatly benefited from re-employment without paying any charges, said IOM Regional Representative in Dhaka Rabab Fatima.
Officials in Dhaka said most of the Bangladeshi returnees had worked for Italian, South Korean, Chinese and Turkish companies, while the others were in Libyan companies.
Libya wants all these foreign companies to return there to speed up its rebuilding process, and these companies will require a large number of foreign workers to resume their operation, they mentioned.
Fresh recruitment process will start when the new authorities in Libya starts functioning fully, said one official, asking not to be named. “It will not take much time,” he added.
-With The Daily Star input
