IOM office to open soon in Seychelles, says regional director Kwenin

IOM office to open soon in Seychelles, says regional director Kwenin

26-October-2018

The International Organisation for Migration will open an office in Seychelles in due time to enable it to work more effectively with the government to maximise the benefit of migration and reduce its negative side effects.

Charles Kwenin, the new regional director for the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) for Southern Africa, said this after presenting his accreditation letter to Vice-President Vincent Meriton, who is also the Minister responsible for Foreign Affairs, yesterday morning at the Maison Quéau de Quinssy, the headquarters of the department of foreign affairs.

IOM works to help ensure the orderly and humane management of migration and it does so by providing services and advice to governments and migrants.

“We have the desire to establish an office in Seychelles because it’s the only country in the Southern Africa region where IOM does not have an office and it’s our desire to sign a host country agreement and that will enable us to work more effectively with the government to maximise the benefit of migration and at the same time to reduce the negative side effects of migration,” Mr Kwenin said.

Mr Kwenin’s role as IOM representative for Southern Africa and Seychelles over a five-year period will be to supervise the implementation of IOM’s policies in place.

Together with Vice-President Meriton, they discussed how to combat human trafficking in Seychelles, on Seychelles’ achievements within the African continent to be among the top countries on the World Bank human capacity index and also of Seychelles being the best African country with easy entry access whereby visas are not required.

“So we hope to work together to improve on that and we also discussed on how to improve the capacity of the government and the civil society in improving migration governance in the Southern African region and especially in the Indian Ocean countries and Seychelles in particular, given that small island states also have their own challenges and abilities including misuse of disaster risk reduction, misuse of maritime security, migration, environment and climate change and resilience,” Mr Kwenin added, noting that working together to mobilising resources for contribution in socio economic of the Seychelles’ diaspora, was also a topic of discussion.

A Ghanaian national, Mr Kwenin succeeded Josiah Ogina as the new regional director of the IOM for Southern Africa and he will be based in Pretoria, South Africa.

This is his third visit to Seychelles.
http://www.nation.sc/article.html?id=260973

International Organization for Migration
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Organization_for_Migration

Letter to the Editor - GETUS supports move to put order in recruitment of foreign workers

26-October-2018
The General Employer Trade Union of Seychelles (GETUS) would like to make an official statement vis-a-vis the announcement of Employment principal secretary Jules Baker on Wednesday in the national news about the ‘Ban on employment of Bangladesh nationals’.

GETUS would like to inform all employers and entrepreneurs in Seychelles that the ban imposed for the upcoming six (6) months on the employment of new Bangladesh nationals by the Ministry of Employment, Immigration and Civil Status is fully supported.

Based on the GETUS member reports, the number of issues with this specific nationals have caused lots of delays and financial concern as presented by PS Baker yesterday on the "Aktyalite" programme on Telesesel.

It is primordial that the Government is aware of the exact number of foreign workers in the country, knowing how they entered, in which position they are employed, under which conditions they are treated by the employers, and if they are respecting the clause on their GOP.

This exercise that the ministry will conduct during the upcoming six months, will not only help the situation with the Bangladeshi nationals but shall also be the opportunity of improving the system, to spot any weaknesses in the system to avoid falling again in this type of issues.

GETUS fully appreciates the initiative of the bilateral agreement between Seychelles and Bangladesh to reinforce the collaboration, and will be more than happy to assist the government with any input required from the employer perspectives.

As per Telesesel, there are 1724 employees of Bangladesh nationality in Seychelles, in different sectors of the economy, and in 2017, there were a total of 20794 GOPs issued for non Seychellois workers (data from the Ministry of Employment, Immigration and Civil Status).

This figures clearly shows that Seychelles cannot function without foreign workers, but there is an urgent need to have a strict control on the foreign workers management.

GETUS will be always ready to protect the employer right and to collaborate with the government for the benefit of the entire Seychelles workforce.

The General Employer Trade Union of Seychelles (GETUS)
http://www.nation.sc/article.html?id=260965

Workshop looks at improving labour migration in Seychelles
http://www.nation.sc/article.html?id=260982