Protesting the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA), all the employees of the Department of Foreign Employment (DoFE), today, visited the Ministry of Labour and Employment (MoLE) asking for a collective transfer from the department, stating that they are feeling insecure due to CIAA’s act. The CIAA arrested nine employees, including a director of the department on Wednesday.

All 160 employees of DoFE came to this decision 24 hours after CIAA arrested their colleagues under the charge of approving fake documents produced by manpower companies. The arrested are still in CIAA’s custody. At present, 50 employees work at the department, whereas 38 work at the Kathmandu office. Similarly, 24 people work at Malaysia, Qatar and Saudi Arabia branches each. The officials were accused of providing final work permits to 109 individuals seeking foreign employment in Qatar and 63 persons seeking employment in Dubai based on fake documents.

“Mentally we are not in a state to work in the department because a small error can put us behind bars,” said an officer at DoFE under the condition of anonymity.

“A group of 15 to 20 employees met minister at MoLE Tek Bahadur Gurung and put forward the problem and asked for a transfer,” said spokesperson at DoFE Badri Karki, adding that minister Gurung asked them to continue their work and forward dubious cases to the ministry for a decision.

Due to the arrests made by the CIAA, the department was busy in meetings today and the work of manpower agencies almost came to a halt. However, according to the section officer at DoFE Upendra Neupane, work related to manpower agencies was disrupted because DoFE ran out of work permit stickers, not due to the arrests made by the CIAA.

Everyday, the department gives labour permits to more than 1,000 workers who come through manpower agencies and 1,500 individual migrants.

On the other hand, president of Nepal Association of Foreign Employment Agencies Hansha Raj Wagley said, “Due to the tussle between CIAA and DoFE, manpower agencies have incurred a loss of at least Rs 100 million.” He also said that more than 700 manpower agencies suffered today and they want the government to compensate for this loss.

Published on: 21 March 2014 | The Himalayan Times