The Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training is set to sign a memorandum of understanding with Amala, a UAE-based company, to send domestic workers to the gulf state.
“The MoU will be struck during Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s visit to the United Arab Emirates from October 25-27,” BMET Director General Begum Shamsun Nahar told the Dhaka Tribune yesterday.
A three-member delegation, led by Expatriates’ Welfare and Overseas Employment Minister Khandker Mosharraf Hossain, will accompany the prime minister who is scheduled to leave Dhaka this (Saturday) morning for the UAE.
Shamsun Nahar who will also go with the delegation said Amala is an agency under the Interior Ministry of the UAE. The company will place demand for female workers, she added.
Meanwhile, US-based rights organisation, Human Rights Watch, in its report released on Thursday showed how female workers mostly from Asian countries, including Bangladesh are exploited and abused in the UAE.
When asked how the housemaids would be protected from exploitation and abuse, the director general of the BMET, a regulatory body of overseas employment, said Amala would monitor the issue. Each housemaid would be provided with a SIM to lodge complaint to the Amala authority, she added.
Preferring anonymity, a senior official concerned said the government would stress the need for reopening the labour market in the UAE.
The issue of female migrants’ abuse is unlikely to be raised during the prime minister’s visit. This issue might be addressed through another diplomatic channel, he added.
While finalising the draft MoU, Amala had put demand for 1,000 housemaids, he said, adding that they had agreed to send 200 workers.
As per the agreement, Amala would ask the employers to place demands on housemaids and later would inform the BMET about it.
The official said aspirant female migrants would be able to go to the UAE free of cost and one would get Tk18,000 a month.
According to BMET website, 54,878 female workers went to different countries, including the UAE, Jordan, Lebanon and Oman between January and September this year. Of them, 16,691 female workers went to the UAE during the period.
