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| Kathmandu, Thursday May 09, 2002 Baishakh 26, 2059. |
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Pay due heed
This refers to the article titled
"Nepalese workers’ agony in Malaysia", dated April 29, 2002, TKP.
Mathema, who is currently living in Kuala
Lumpur, has written very impressively about agony and misery that the poor Nepalese people
are bearing as workers of factories or fields in Malaysia. Two Nepalese youths had also
complained about similar problems they had been facing when I was on a short visit to
Malaysia few months ago.
At present about 40 thousand Nepalese people
are working in Malaysia. But only two thousand people have been allowed legally. Such a
whopping number of work permits opened the door of employment opportunities for those who
were reeling in poverty. However, unless the working condition in that country improves,
the government must not allow more Nepalese to go there. Otherwise there will be more
cases of exploitation and insecurity. Mathema has suggested opening of Royal Nepalese
Embassy in Malaysia. He has also hinted that mere ten Malaysian Ringgits collected per
Nepalese worker in that country will be enough to cover the cost of running the embassy.
Another option is to rethink about closing the embassy, which has been proved less
effective due to changed inter-relationship with that country, like Myanmar, and avail the
saved money for the new embassy. Such an option will be very realistic for a country,
which is under severe resource crunch.
Dhruba Nepal
Koteshwar, Kathmandu |
