By Spy Uganda
Kampala: Since the outbreak of COVID-19 Pandemic a couple of Ugandans stranded abroad have been struggling to return back home despite limited transport means.
Using this chance, there has been some fraudulent unscrupulous individuals and organizations purporting to offer a variety of services to migrant workers like repatriation, rescue those who have escaped from their employers, follow on the sick ones and mostly stranded Ugandans in the Middle East particularly have been victims.
Not only that but the said individuals/organizations have circulated registration forms calling upon migrant workers or Ugandans with relatives working in the Middle East to pay registration fees for the false services offered.
It is against that background that the Ministry Of Gender Labour And Social Development has issued a statement highlighting the above illegal acts by the unscrupulous individuals and organizations saying that those are pure false and whoever ever deals with them does so on their own risk.
The Ministry of Gender Statement reads “We have further noted that ever since the Government allowed stranded Ugandans abroad to return, there is false alarm respect of migrant workers on some social media platforms propagated by these organizations and some relatives of the Workers who want their relatives to return.
The public is informed that the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development, as the regulator of externalization of labour, has not authorized and/or accredited any individual or organization to do repatriation, rescue, follow up, monitoring or any other service to Ugandan migrant workers in the Middle East.
Together with the responsibility of licensed external recruitment agencies, their umbrella association UAERA and the respective Ugandan Missions abroad, the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development receives and follows up distressed/stranded migrant workers working at no cost. Indeed, the Ministry has successfully resolved several cases of distress and the migrant workers have been repatriated.
The Ministry calls upon members of the public that have relatives who migrated to work in the Middle East and are under distress or might be stranded due to the current lockdown to lodge complaints with the recruitment agencies that externalized the migrant workers and subsequently with the Ministry if no assistance is extended.
Members of the public are therefore are warned against registering and/dealing with these unscrupulous individuals/organizations, Whoever deals with them shall do so at their own risk”
