BANGLADESH Association of International Recruiting Agencies on Tuesday requested the government to blacklist the Saudi employers who are involved in abusing female workers. The BAIRA leaders asked Bangladesh missions in Riyadh and Jeddah to take legal action against the employers. In this backdrop of the growing number of sexually abused female workers return from the Gulf nations, the call for action by the BAIRA is a logical outcome. Several rights bodies have asked for suspending women migration before settling the cases where female workers were abused by their respective employers.
A BRAC survey has found questionable deaths of female migrant workers in the recent years. Between 2016 and June this year, corpses of 311 women migrants were sent from the Middle East, mostly from Saudi Arabia. Of them, 53 died by suicide, 120 due to stroke and 56 in accidents. Over the years, incidents of committing suicide have seen an alarming rise — from 1 in 2016 to 17 so far this year. This year, one in every three deaths is suicide. Such a high number of reported suicides and deaths in strokes raise a lot of suspicions. Employers in the Arab countries, especially in Saudi Arabia, consider these female domestic workers as slaves. So they behave with them as their wish.
It is not a mystery why poor women going to work abroad to committing suicide. We penned down over the issue several times that majority of female migrant workers are victims of sexual harassment and torture. It is right time to investigate the allegations and cases seriously and identify why such unnatural deaths are happening in large numbers. There are several laws for expatriate manpower and manpower migration; however, no law can confirm the dignity of the female workers until reaching a bilateral agreement, and strong enforcement of the clauses of the agreement, enabling migrant workers safety, security, regular wage, and others.
BAIRA’s call for blacklisting Saudi employers is undoubtedly a befitting step at this crisis moment. Side by side, our government should also blacklist the middlemen and local recruiting agencies who cheat poor women in the name of providing them lucrative overseas jobs.
