NEWS on the death of scores of Bangladeshi migrant workers by hunger and from diseases amid the perilous journey by rubber boats in the Mediterranean Sea, mostly starting off the coastline of Libya towards their dreamland, Italy, has somehow become the order, save the bereft families, who for some time wail loudly, drawing attention and sympathy of others, but silently drag the loss for ages to come. But what message do these deaths at sea carry for the state is a gap: the lack of effective communication on migration between aspirant migrant workers and migration management.
It is because of the absence or unavailability of adequate information on migration that youthful minds from the remotest parts of the country rely on the misinformation of local intermediaries, based on which they make the decision to go out there in quest of fortune so that they could change the lot of the family as well as their own. And hence lies the importance of a migration communication strategy which organizations such as the International Organisation for Migration and the International Centre for Migration Policy Development have campaigned for in the countries that send workers abroad.
The psychology of widely spreading fabricated, alluring stories and false notions teaches that people start believing the misinformation when the urge to know the real is acute but the fact is beyond their reach or unavailable. And it is true in cases of unemployed rural young people who want to lead a meaningful life by getting engaged in work. When they find it difficult in the country, they feel the urge to go abroad for livelihood. And there is a time for everything, the youthful days to do something, and there is, of course, the enticing of the frauds around, offering paradisal promises too irresistible to ignore. This is the phase where the state has to come forward if it means to reap the demographic dividend.
Apart from the international bodies on migration management and counselling, home-grown migration experts and academics repeatedly point at the lack of migration management in this regard. They are of the opinion that migration governance, according to international best practices, is responsible for establishing an effective communication system to let aspirant migrants know the basic information about legal requirements, eligibility for migration, the cost involved, and the opportunities they could avail themselves of in return if they migrated overseas for work. The information must be made available to each and every citizen willing to go abroad for work. But it is a role that migration management is yet to play.
Another side of the story is that irrespective of whatever information is provided by formal channels such as the district manpower and employment offices and the state media, there are people who play down the dictums and opt for riding the high horse of risks to migrate, be it crossing hundreds of miles in the desert or drifting against storms in the foaming sea by rubber boats for days and weeks. Yet, the state’s primary responsibility is to educate them with much effort and dedication because the ignorant and desperate who make up their minds to live by risking their lives are also citizens.
Availing technical support from the International Centre for Migration Policy Development, European Union member states have developed comprehensive migration communication systems and employed overseas migrants in their workplaces. They have developed well-researched online tools that provide information for aspiring migrants of all categories such as students, researchers, factory workers, entrepreneurs, and so on. This system enables member states to choose the best from among the aspirants coming from across the world. Using an online interactive tool like this needs a certain level of technological literacy on part of prospective migrants.
In Bangladesh, the Bureau of Manpower Employment and Training has launched an online migration management system called the Overseas Employment Platform, with basic features such as identities of migrants, number of skilled workers, the name of the recruiting agency, health certification status, grievance redress mechanism, and so on included in it. More features, including allowing access to the OEP for overseas employers and Bangladesh missions abroad, are being considered to make it more effective. This platform could be further developed by including basic components aimed at educating aspiring migrants so that they could use it, find their suitable destinations and occupations by matching their capabilities in terms of migration costs, skills, and other prerequisites.
Additionally, to reach migrants in the most remote areas with relevant information on migration, divisional and district employment and manpower offices, local committees on migration, and union information centres have to be made more responsible, along with providing necessary logistics and technological support from migration governance.
There is no denying that to count billions of dollars of remittance inflows, the authorities need to invest millions in developing a well-regulated, ethical migration management system which could reverse the illegal migration spree and consequent deaths.
Md Mukhlesur Rahman Akand is a joint secretary to the expatriates welfare and overseas employment ministry.
