1000s of Lankans in Iraq

By Tharindri Rupesinghe

Thousands of Sri Lankans - from labourers to doctors - work in war-torn Iraq but their number must be the most closely guarded secret or Sri Lankan authorities simply don’t know the actual amount.

Though off the official radar, Iraq is one of the popular destinations for Sri Lankan migrant workers and unofficial estimates of the number range from 15,000 to 75,000, according to industry officials. Kingsley Ranawaka, Chairman of the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE), when contacted by The Sunday Times FT conceded there are Sri Lankans but say they are unregistered workers and he didn’t know how many.

“There are a large number of undocumented workers. In fact 40 percent of male workers are going to Iraq because of the high salaries which are three to four times more than the rest of the Middle East,” according to Suraj Dandeniya, President of the Association of Licensed Foreign Employment Agents. “We have also spoken to the US embassy officials here to ascertain the number of Sri Lankans.”

He attributes the fall in the number of workers migrating this year when compared with 2006 to the increase in undocumented workers. On the other hand remittances have increased purely because of contributions from workers in Iraq.

Another industry official said the number of registered official workers has fallen by about 40 percent but also agreed that this may be due to the discrepancy caused by the flow to Iraq which has drawn Sri Lankan workers over the past one to two years. He said due to the risk, if a worker gets 2,000 Riyals in Saudi, he would get at least 4,500 Riyals in Baghdad.

He said because the government doesn’t encourage working in Iraq, worker contracts are prepared by a few job agencies and information about jobs is available on an unofficial network. The common route to Iraq is through a visit visa to Kuwait, Jordan, Dubai and then crossing the border.The categories in demand in Iraq are cleaning staff, hotel workers including chefs, construction workers, doctors and para medics.

The official, discussing other issues confronting the industry, said though there are many jobs for professionals offered in the Middle East, there are few takers due to an unusual problem.

He said when the state employment agency owned by the SLBFE advertises in the local media for vacancies in various fields, applications from Sri Lankan skilled workers are collected and as a result these potential migrants don’t apply to jobs offered by private licensed recruiters. “Sri Lankans always trust the government mechanism than the private sector. By taking the advantage of it, the state agency collects all the CV's and keeps them in a data bank without any available jobs,” he said, adding that nowhere in the world is there a situation where the regulator (SLBFE) also runs its own employment agency. “This is a clear conflict of interest but no one has thought of rectifying this issue,” he said.