Legal education
IOM to promote Migration law course
Dr. Uttam Kumar Das
Bangladesh is a major labour sending country. In 2007, about 832,000 individuals left the country with overseas employment. The amount of remittance is US$ 6.5 billion. During current fiscal year until May, the country has earned about US$ 7.1 billion as remittance.
It has been a thrusting foreign exchange earning sector for the country. However, it is now widely acknowledged that there is a need for better management of the sector to realize its potential benefits and minimize any adverse impacts through exploring new market opportunities and preventing reported abuses and exploitations in the labour migration processes.
There are some laws and regulations to deal with issues relating to labour migration from Bangladesh. These include the Emigration Ordinance 1982, Emigration Rules 2002, Recruiting Agent's Conduct and License Rules 2002, and Wage Earners' Welfare Fund Rules 2002.
Apart from that, the Government of Bangladesh has adopted the Overseas Employment Policy 2006. The Ministry of Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment (MOEWOE) has prepared a Strategy Paper in December 2007 to boost overseas employment opportunity.
It is also acknowledged that the existing laws and regulations relating to migration in Bangladesh need serious review and modification to meet the demand of the time.
The Ministry of Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment (MOEWOE) of the Government of Bangladesh has decided to review and update laws and regulations related to labour migration from Bangladesh.
Being approached for technical assistance, IOM has already taken up some activities in collaboration with the MOEWOE, which is funded by USAID/Bangladesh.
These activities include formation of an Inter-Ministerial Committee (which already been formed and headed by the Joint Secretary, MOEWOE) for “Strengthening Information Collection and Monitoring Capacity over Overseas Employment Recruitment Services in Bangladesh.” Apart from that, IOM has been undertaking four studies including one on the review of existing legal framework relating to labour migration.
Although Bangladesh has already signed the Convention on the Rights of All Migrants Workers' and Members of their Families 1990, however it did not ratify the instrument yet. There is a need to consider the ratification of the Convention.
Apart from that, there is a lack of general understanding on the migration issues and legal framework and rights of the migrant workers in the country.
In this backdrop, the Office of the International Organizational Organization for Migration (IOM) has initiated to promote migration related issues through various activities. The newly added one is with the academic arena.
In the first place, IOM is in the process of advocating with law schools both at the public and private universities to incorporate International Migration Law (IML) in the regular curriculum. IOM has already designed a course outline on IML and shared with different law schools.
The course has been designed incorporating fundamentals of migration, international, regional and national legal framework relating to migration, trafficking and smuggling in persons etc.
So far, five law schools have initiated to introduce IML in the LL.M. Programme to be offered to students soon.
IOM will be organising a national level seminar on the significance of studying IML in coming months.
IOM is also approaching other academic and training institutes to introduce migration related issues in their curriculum. Discussion is also going on for introducing certificate or diploma programmes on IML.
This type of course would facilitate to have a pool of individuals having sound knowledge and understanding of various dimensions of migration issues. In future, they would be in various positions including in the Government, judiciary, legal practice and academia.
The introduction of migration issues in the curriculum would have a long-term positive impact in the management of the issue in the country. IOM Office will be pleased to extend necessary technical support (i.e. development of curriculum and training for faculty members) in introducing courses on migration issues for interested institutions.
The writer is National Programme Officer of the International Organization for Migration, Mission with Regional Functions for South Asia, Dhaka.
