Nepal’s foreign employment sector keeps on making it to the news, unfortunately, mostly for the wrong reasons. The latest in this series is about how innocent Nepalis, a majority of them women, are taken to the Gulf state of Kuwait on fake passports. 

According to a report sent by the Nepali embassy in Kuwait to the Ministry of Home Affairs, of the 60,000 Nepalis working in Kuwait, 22,000 out of which 98 percent are women have landed in the oil-rich country on fake passports. The modus operandi is simple: The manpower mafia replaces the photographs on the passports and sends innocent and unsuspecting Nepalis with the promise that things will be hunky-dory once they reach the Gulf country.

But this is just one of the ills of foreign employment and an offshoot of larger problems that are often discussed in this space, the chief among which is the absence of a proper governmental monitoring mechanism. Had it not been for government failure, more than a million Nepalis would not have reached foreign shores illegally. While about 1.5 million Nepalis are working in foreign countries (minus India) legally, it is said that an equal number have landed abroad illegally. There must be something terribly wrong in the functioning of the government when such a large number of people with the help of dubious manpower agencies can work around the rules and regulations of the government.  

The chief problem with our foreign employment sector is that we continue to see migration for work as a short-term phenomenon, thus failing to put systems and processes in place. It is high time the government woke up to the reality that Nepal’s foreign employment sector is here to stay. At least the way in which politics is moving forward does not in any way point to the creation of a significant number of jobs in the short-term. Nepal needs to take cues from the Philippines, whose labor market is seen as a prototype of foreign employment all around the world. There are proper mechanisms in place that ensure the safety and security of its citizens. And this has been possible simply because the South-East Asian nation has accepted foreign employment as one of its most vital industries.

Foreign employment has done a lot for Nepal. In the absence of remittances from migrant workers, the Nepali economy would immediately collapse. But despite its phenomenal contribution, it has received little attention and care from the government. The government must give a serious thought to regulating this industry, which will be one of the country’s chief sources of revenue for a long time to come. In the meantime, the concerned authorities should immediately focus on giving whatever help is required to the 22,000 Nepalis who face grave risks and are likely to be persecuted, shortly or afterwards, without support from the government.

Published on: 27 September 2011 | Republica