CNI News

5 August 2023

The Ministry of Labor is scrutinizing to protect nominal foreign employment agencies and ones that are not operating rightly and to enable agencies that can really invest and operate to apply for licenses, according to the business coordination meeting of the Ministry of Labor held on 2nd August, 2023.
When the ministry scrutinizes agencies' license applications, it included a rule that agencies must fully protect the workers they sent if the workers experience any problem in foreign countries, said the ministry.

The ministry mainly needed to free from corruption when it issued new licenses to foreign employment agencies. said U Ba Yi, worker in charge of the Migrant Workers Rights Network (MWRN) to CNI News.

Office of the OWIC

To tell you frankly, the Ministry of Labor mainly must be free from corruption. It needs to take action against the agencies that don't perform rightly. When the MoU workers are sent abroad, officials need to supervise the agencies. Because the ministry effectively didn't take action against the agencies that broke the law, these agencies changed their names one after another. The problems like that have been existing since 10 years ago. So, the Ministry of Labor should abstain from corruption and if the ministry supervise the agencies systematically for the benefit of the working class, the problems will decrease, I think." he said.        

The ministry are taking action against some foreign employment agencies and permanently closed the business licenses of 25 foreign employment agencies which broke the rules in the last week of July, it announced. However, because these agencies tend to re-apply for new licenses after changing the names of entrepreneurs and agencies, the ministry should scrutinize carefully, said the people helping migrant workers.

A labor office

" We've found that a list of blacklisted agencies published every three months or six months. But an agency that was blacklisted re-apply for a new license after changing the names. The authorities concerned also know that. In fact, the agencies that broke the rules must be taken action against. If they are really punished, better agencies that can take responsibilities will arise" said U Min Oo, worker in charge of the FED.

The ministry should carefully check whether the agencies send the workers to right workplaces and employments in accordance with the contracts with the workers, those who are helping migrant workers said. 
The agencies that take responsibility make sure to solve if a worker that they sent finds something inconvenient. But the agencies that don't take any responsibility don't solve any problems reportedly.