2013-01-31
Md Owasim Uddin Bhuyan
Newage
1
Newage
Bangladesh
Women workers’ woes mount abroad
Workers asked not to leave country without govt permission
Md Owasim Uddin Bhuyan
Many female workers of the country working abroad are facing problems including sexual harassment and financial deprivations said rights organizations.
The workers often are denied food and drinking water, they said.
They identified language barrier as also a problem facing the female workers.
Officials said some of the female workers working in Lebanon, Jordan, UAE and Oman who faced such problems sought help from the government as well as the concerned NGOs.
Bangladesh Obhibashi Mohila Sramik Association said it received 35 complaints a month on an average.
Founded by women workers, who came back after working abroad, BOMSA helps those now working abroad.
BOMSA founding general secretary Sheikh Rumana told New Age on Wednesday that the female migrant workers who are mostly unlettered are cheated by brokers at home and by their employers abroad.
She said that they often face sexual abuses and physical torture.
Some of the employers are rude and do not provide wages or food according to the agreements, she said.
Some of the employers treat housemaids as slaves, she said.
Bomsa receives complaints from the women workers mostly working in Dubai, Lebanon, Jordan and Oman.
She said that those working in Saudi Arabia seldom complain.
Though the workers were not required to pay anything to get employment, most of them had to pay Tk 50,000 or 60,000 per head to brokers or middlemen, said Rumana.
She said that due to the government’s indifference the female workers seldom get help from in tackling the problems they face.
She said that the government had a constitutional obligation to stand by the female workers who work so hard to send a huge amount of remittances to the country.
Often the female workers were recruited for garment factories in Jordan, but they ended up as housemaids, said Rumana.
She called it a gross violation of contracts.
Bangladesh Probashi Kallyan Society, another rights organization, also received complaints of physical and mental torture, confinement and denial of food from the female workers working in Lebanon, Bahrain, Oman and Jordan.
BPKS executive director Harunur Rashid told New Age that his organization dealt with the problem facing a female worker in Lebanon.
The Lebanese employer refused to giving the housemaid more than two or three glasses of drinking water per day, he said.
The employer also locked her up and let her take bath once every six or seven days.
He said that due to language barrier the workers were unable to communicate with their employers for which they often face extra problems.
BPKS said that 30-year old Lucky sought help to bring her back from Bahrain, where she had gone to work only 45 days back.
Wife of Suman Hossain, she comes from Jessore.
She complained to her husband over phone that she was facing physical torture.
Kulsom, 28, daughter of Toiab Ali Mollah, of Laxminarayan village at Sakhipur upazila in Shariatpur, has been brought back by the government from Muscat, about a year and half after she had gone there to work. She was subjected to physical torture and denied food.
It cost her family Tk 60,000 to send her.
Her elder brother Tara Mia complained to BPKS that she was sold by his sister-in-law Nilufa Yesmin, with support from two brokers Khorshed Alam and Seraj in Bangladesh.
Nilufa Yesmin herself works in Oman.
Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training officials told New Age that a handful of the female workers complained about problems including sexual abuse, physical and mental torture mostly in Lebanon.
According to BMET, a total of 206,525 female workers went abroad on jobs from 1991 to December 31, 2012.
Of them, 65,070 female workers went to Lebanon while 55, 011 to UAE, 31,633 to Saudi Arabia, 18,066 to Jordan, 10,027 to Mauritius, 7,658 to Kuwait, 6,430 to Oman and 3512 to Bahrain.
Officials said most of them went to ME countries as housemaids and garment workers at wages ranging from US $ 175 to 200 each month per person.
When asked, expatriate welfare and overseas employment minister Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain told New Age on Wednesday over phone that recently the government started sending both female and male workers after ensuring their jobs abroad.
He said labor attaches at Bangladesh missions in many countries were ready to help the workers facing problems.
If female or male worker faces any problem abroad he or she can seek help through proper channel and the government would take legal measures and appoint lawyers if needed to realize their dues and compensations from the employers, said the minister.
He said around 85 lakh of workers from Bangladesh are working in many countries and some of them might face problems.
The minister requested the workers aspiring to work abroad not to leave the country without permission from the government.
He said that the workers could expect to get all sorts of help from the government if they go abroad within its knowledge.
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