Malawi Job Centre Ltd faults  govt on Kuwait job nightmares

A renowned local recruitment agency has blamed government failure to regulate the job recruitment industry as the main cause of trafficking that has left many Malawians abused at work places in foreign countries.

Job Centre Limited executive director Trevor Kandoje said there are so many job recruiting agencies who do clandestine job recruitment.

“The job recruitment agencies are just interested in money. They take desperate Malawians and dump them say in Kuwait. They do not screen the would-be employers, this is why some Malawians were abused and stranded in Kuwait,” he said.

He said there was need for government to register all job recruitment agencies in the country which should include physically visiting their places of work to authenticate their existence as some of them are bogus.

Kandoje said after registering them, the government should give them licences as evidence that they are authorised to recruit people for foreign jobs.

He said the Kuwait incident, when the government spent huge sums of money to repatriate stranded desperate and abused Malawian job seekers could have been avoided if the government traced thje recruiting agency.

“The cost of bringing these people from Kuwait could have been borne by the recruiting agency not the government,” said Kandoje.

Some Malawians lured into foreign jobs are forced to do odd jobs including women working in brothels and usually their passports are snatched by their bogus employers.

Foreign Affairs minister Francis Kasaira has warned Malawians against taking up jobs in Arab countries following reports of abuse.