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Friday, 25 January 2013 04:31 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
By Uditha Jayasinghe
The Government has decided to increase the age limit for female migrant workers in Saudi Arabia as the first step in the process to curtail their employment in that country after a housemaid was executed earlier this month, an official said on Thursday.
Cabinet approved the decision presented by Foreign Employment Promotion Minister Dilan Perera.
Accordingly the minimum age for women seeking employment in Saudi Arabia is 25 years and in seven other Middle East countries it will be 23 years. Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Cyprus, which have better working conditions, will receive female workers at 21 years.
“There have been various groups proposing that the age limit should be increased. We do not plan to stop housemaids going their completely but hope to curtail it. For the first time in history the percentage of women seeking employment abroad has dropped to 48 per cent, which we see as a good sign,” Cabinet Spokesman and Media Minister Keheliya Rambukwella said.
In addition the Government has also established a housing project for migrant workers. Under this program, the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE) will place a fixed deposit of Rs. 100 million from its own funds at the Samurdhi Bank.
The Samurdhi Bank will then provide loans to cover construction costs of houses up to a maximum of Rs. 300,000. The Samurdhi Bank and Rural Development Bank will also provide entrepreneurship loans of Rs. 250,000 for returnee migrant workers who have been approved by SLBFE.
The steps come after the Sri Lankan Government was severely criticised for sending an under-aged woman as a housemaid to Saudi Arabia. She was convicted of choking her employer’s baby to death and was imprisoned in 2005.
Rizana Nafeek was handed the death sentence by a Saudi Court and despite her denying the charges, was executed two weeks ago after being in prison for seven years. She was 17 at the time of the crime, making her a minor and therefore not eligible for capital punishment according to international law.
This has provoked women’s rights activists to lobby for the Government to end sending women to Saudi Arabia – a demand that the Government has dodged so far.
Even though Rambukwella reiterated that all Government assistance was given to Rizana, he insisted that other Sri Lankans convicted of crimes in Middle East countries would be evaluated individually before similar help is extended.
The island has nearly a million citizens working in the Middle East, most of them as housemaids. The Government is heavily dependent on the remittances with the 2012 figure expected to be around US$ 6 billion.
