Labour

Why NLC gives much attention to Labour migration governance issues —Eustace

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2 years ago

Labour migration is a major issue in the migration governance space globally. In this interview, Comrade James Eustace, Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) Focal Person on Migration, gave insight on why the NLC invests so much on it, tasking the Federal Government on initiatives that will serve the interest of migrant Nigerians. CHRISTIAN APPOLOS brings details.

Why does the NLC give so much attention to labour migration governance issues?

I want to start by saying the NLC ab initio had engaged in migration issues because when we talk about workers, we are talking about workers globally, whether in Nigeria or outside Nigeria and that has made the NLC to form several alliances or collaborations with other sister trade unions, global union federations and international labour organisations, with the view to protecting the human and labour rights of all workers, whether migrant workers or national workers.

Because of the global surge in migration incidences, including people migrating through unorthodox ways, some via the Sahara desert, with many people being smuggled, trafficked and migrant workers abused, it became necessary that the trade unions’ voice should be louder in the migration governance space.

That is what arouse the consciousness of the NLC to be more effective and active in advocating for better labour migration governance and the protection of migrant workers’ rights. Statistics have shown that about 85 percent of migrants are mainly migrating for employment purposes. What that means is that migrant workers dominate the migration space. So, the trade union that is responsible for the protection of the labour or human rights of workers must also take center stage in this debate. The NLC, in the past three years, has been fully engaged in developing and devising strategic means and alliances to engage in visible promotion of the protection of the human labour rights of migrant workers, especially with the COVID-19 which ravished the entire globe in the year 2020. The major victims of that pandemic were migrant workers, because many were forced back to their countries involuntarily. Actually, migrant workers were demonised as the vector of the COVID-19 and as the main carriers, even when they were not. But because they were migrants, the crisis had the heavy toll on them.

Given that scenario, we had a collaboration with the International Labour Organisation (ILO), through the ILO FAIRWAY programme: it was about promoting better labor migration, especially to GCC (Guff Cooperation Council) countries. And that has really assisted the NLC in hyping its activities in the area of labour migration governance.

To be specific, in terms of achievement, the NLC has been able to increase capacity building for its affiliates and national and regional levels, whereby bringing them to terms with the reality of labour migration, the necessity for it and the importance of protecting migrant workers. That has assisted the NLC to develop some working tools. For instance: the Trade Union Information Guide on Return and Reintegration of Migrants and Migrant Workers in Nigeria was developed through the collaboration between the NLC and ILO FAIRWAY programme, which is a very visible and sustainable achievement.

The tool is there for information sake, to guide migrant workers who want to return and those who want to reintegrate into the system, which could also be used for migrant workers in destination country to make informed decision on return and integration. Secondly, through this same collaboration, the NLC has gone beyond verbal collaboration with sister trade union organisations in Africa. As we talk now, the NLC has signed an MoU with the General Federation of Bahrain Trade Union on the protection of the rights of migrant workers, particularly Nigeria migrants in Bahrain.

Then, another achievement now is that the NLC just concluded a study on the social protection challenges faced by migrant workers at workplaces in Nigeria. It is in a draft stage and will soon be validated.

What is NLC’s involvement with the group, ATUMNET?

ATUMNET is African Trade Unions Migration Network. It is a body of affiliate of all focal persons on labour migration of national labour centers that are affiliated to the ITUC-Africa. It is a formidable body that helps to set agenda for national centers on migration activities, driven from a global perspective down to national perspective. They do meet annually to review the work plan and to take stock of activities that have been implemented by different national center. And I will tell you that the NLC is one of the foremost actor in ATUMNET. In fact, NLC is the role model to other African trade unions in driving labour migration activity that are concrete.

We have gone beyond just mere academic activities. We’ve organised good shows, protesting for the protection of the rights of migrant workers in Nigeria. Protest to foreign missions, asking especially for the abolition of the Kafala system in the GCC countries. We’ve staged a protest at the UAE embassy in Nigeria. We’ve done a protest to the Saudi Arabian embassy in Nigeria, advocating for the rights of Nigeria migrants in those countries living as slaves in the Kafala arrangement.

What is the level of NLC’s engagement with the Federal Government on labour migration governance?

The Nigeria Labour Congress is also a critical stakeholder at both the national technical working group of the National Migration Policy and in National Policy on Labour Migration. The government has adopted two policies on migration – the National Migration Policy and the National Policy for Labour Migration, a thematic policy for labour migration.

The NLC is a member of the Social Partner Advisory Committee of the National Policy of Labour Migration, which is implementing activities in collaboration with the Federal Government, through the Ministry of Labour and Employment. Our collaboration so far at the government level has been very robust and the partners have also been very appreciative of the NLC because of our visible activities in contributing to better labour migration governance.

Compare to other countries’ involvement in migration governance, what is Nigerian government doing in terms of initiatives to benefit migrant workers outside the country?

That is where sometimes we go at loggerheads with the Federal Government because our approach as trade union to labour migration is purely from the human rights angle. Our stand is that labour migrants are humans, whether regular or irregular status. But the Federal Government’s approach to migration is purely in favour of regular migrants. The Nigerians in Diaspora Commission is simply looking at migrants that are having regular status. But we are saying migrants with irregular status are also migrant. They are even more important and they need more protection than those that have the regular status, because those who have regular status can defend their rights but those with irregular status are those that are being abused. And because of the government’s perspective around economic drive and development, they look at remittances more from economic angle, but we have also argued that if you look into statistics, the remittances from to those in irregular status may be more than that of those in regular status. But because they are not captured in official document, you won’t know.

Those in irregular status also send money for family, social support for their homes and community, may be through unofficial channel that the CBN does not have record of. So, such persons are even our major concern, because they are human beings and they are workers, they need to be protected more than those who are already established that we call diaspora. So, the state’s focus is just on diaspora, what then happens to many Nigerians who are workers but without regular status where they are?

That is why one of our major advocacy points is that our government should collaborate government-to-government to promote regular pathways. Beyond promoting regular pathways, it must also regularise those that are already in irregular status, by making them have access to documentation in line with the Global Compact on Migration (GCM) objective, because the GCM 23 objectives deals with all of these issues.

A compact was adopted in Marrakech in Morocco two years ago to promote safe, orderly and regular migration. What that means according to one of the GCM objective is that state should build deliberate effort to give avenue to those in irregular status to regularize their status.

State having collaborations, including BLAs, Bilateral Labour Agreements. Our workers are already in your country, and they are contributing to the economy of your country, they are still in irregular status, give them opportunities to get their status regularised. These are what government-to-government agreements should be.

Because once a worker is under irregular status, he or she is more prone to abuses and exploitation because they doesn’t even have access to legal remedies. Because if you are not registered, how do you go approach a lawyer or approach a court. So this is one of the things we are telling our government do but the irony is that up to now, in spite of Nigerians everywhere, our government have no succeeded in signing a single labour bilateral agreement to help and protect its citizens.

What is the call then?

The call is that government need to expedite action on issues of labour migration governance. Government should be more focused on the plight of migrant workers, especially those in irregular status.

Why islabour migration attracting so much attention globally?

Migration issue became very important because of several reasons. For developed countries, there are what we call push factors that are pulling migrants from less developed countries; and this includes demographic change, depopulation, people are aging and the shrinking of workforce.

That is why some country are liberalising their visa approaches, giving offer to people with certain skills because the workforce is draining. For instance, in Canada to the health sector, there are few doctors. The friend in Canada told me that to access a doctor is very difficult because they have shortage of doctors. So, that is one reason, the demographic change.

Two the push factor for developing countries are gradually becoming increasing on a daily basis. Issues around poverty, hardship, unemployment, poor educational system, poor health facility, all of these plus political crisis, insurgency. So people want to migrate where they get better job opportunity, better educational for their children. So these are what is pushing migration.

People will say that migration is a global crisis today but the argument we have always put forward as trade unions is that Migration is not the crisis but the governance of migration is the crisis. If migration governance is done in a better way that is pro human, then we won’t have the issues associated with migration. Whether you like it or not, the developed country encouraged people to migrate from here to their place.

So in other words, every serious government should take migration issue seriously. Especially now that remittances from migrants is now major development index of many African countries. For countries like Somali remittances remittances from migrants is almost 80 percent of the GDP. So how do you neglect such a group of people?And one thing I’ve always argued is that our government sometimes is short sighted. Forgetting that those who now have regular status that you call diaspora may have been under irregular before they were regularised that today they cannot be professionals, they can now contribute and form group you now call diaspora. So why can’t we broaden our horizon to those that are the most vulnerable?

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