Human dignity of migrant workers

The outcome of the recent election may have generated euphoria and ecstasy to the leaders of the present regime, but the sufferings and lack of human dignity of migrant workers, on whose shoulders the regime stands, go completely overlooked. The country had endured untold sufferings over many months — may even be a year and national economy had been mauled by these self-serving political masters and the governance of the country had been rendered ineffectual, but the country moved on. The people within the country may have had some opportunities to voice their total disaffection to the political tug-of-war, but the migrant workers slaving away abroad had none of these. The predicament, let alone the wellbeing, of the millions of workers in far flung lands had been completely overlooked.

Despite all these lapses and abuses of the political supremos and their dynasties, Bangladesh's economy somehow limped along and survived – thanks to the hard work and derogatory low pay of the millions of Bangladeshi workers, both at home and abroad. Although the earnings from the export of garment products rank highest in Bangladesh, very close second are the remittances of the millions of migrant workers. The remittance inflows from nearly 3.5 million migrant workers amount, on a monthly basis, to an average of nearly 1.3 billion US dollars (110 billion BDT) (as of Nov 2013).

This huge influx of resources from the workers abroad may create an illusion of good governance and good government support and facilities for the workers working abroad. But the truth cannot be furthest from the truth. The workers who manage to get jobs abroad, mostly in the Middle East, after paying commissions, hand outs, kickbacks etc. to touts, various government officials and agency staff etc. do so on their own initiatives. These workers risk their life savings, their fortunes and their existence to eek out meagre earnings abroad, only in the hope that they may be able to live a life free from poverty far in the future. The government, the present one as well as the past ones, had done nothing or very little to alleviate the sufferings of these workers, although they benefit tremendously from their remittances.

When a migrant worker from Bangladesh lands at an unfamiliar country, without the language skill or even literacy, he is totally at the mercy of various exploiting agents and his prospective employer. In the Middle East, it is a common practice that his passport would be taken away and an identity card — called Iqama — would be given to him. Most likely the uncouth Arab employer would reduce his previously agreed wage significantly, knowing very well that this poor chap has no recourse but to accept the new offer. This worker is also aware that any dissent would result in immediate dismissal and return home with the loss of all the monies he had forked out so far. The Bangladeshi embassies do not like to know of these problems and no help whatsoever are provided to them.

I posted recently an opinion piece 'Flagrant violation of human rights' where untold suffering and inhuman torture of migrant workers had been exposed. A video clip of the incident talked about in the Opinion showed that a Saudi man was beating a migrant worker with a whip, punching him, kicking him in absolutely inhuman and degrading way. That video clip went viral a couple of months ago and the CNN aired a programme highlighting the plight of migrant workers in the Middle East. The revulsion of the public in the Western World was unprecedented.

The above article clearly demonstrated that despite signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) by the Saudi government and other Middle East Muslim countries, these countries had been persistently violating the provisions of the resolution. For nearly 50 years (1948 to 2008), some of these Muslim countries refused to sign up to this UN resolution on the pretext that as it offers 'the right of an individual to change his or her religion or belief' and also 'equal rights to men and women in marriage' which, they insisted, are against Islam, they cannot sign. However, under relentless pressures from the West, the hardcore Islamic States led by Saudi Arabia propagating the fundamentalist version of the religion called Wahhabism had to yield and signed the resolution in 2008. However, there were innumerable instances of violation of this resolution throughout the whole of this region.

The fundamental tenet of this Human Rights declaration was 'in recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family', all human beings must be treated with dignity. But where is the dignity, when the migrant workers, particularly the ones from Bangladesh, are called 'miskins' meaning 'beggars'? The migrant workers in those countries are helping to improve the infrastructure of those countries, they are definitely not begging. Does the government of Bangladesh make any representation or protestation against such derogatory word which goes against the whole nation? Probably not, as that will jeopardise the prospect of further recruitment of workers and thereby impact on government's coffers of foreign remittances!

The aforementioned article was also sent to all relevant British MPs and Ministers. My local MP, Rt. Hon. Mr Graham Brady who is also the Chairman of the powerful 1922 Committee, took the matter up and sent to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) for further action. The British government takes Human Rights issues very seriously indeed. Already the British Ambassadors in Qatar and Saudi Arabia had raised these issues with those governments and expressed concerns of the stated violation of human rights. Particular concerns were expressed against Qatar where a large number of migrant workers were recruited for the 1922 Qatar World Cup (Football). The British government had already alerted international non-governmental organisations and the Amnesty International.

Bangladesh government should take steps, along with others, to alleviate the sufferings of migrant works and give them the dignity they deserve.

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A Rahman is an author and a columnist.