* Dignitaries at the event pose for a group photograph
…As Participants Call For Kafala Migrants Hiring System Abolition
…Urge African Leaders To Ban Unlicensed Recruiting Agencies
The former Director of Director of Kenyan Law School and Anti-Graft Campaigner Prof. Patrick Lumumba has called on African Union(AU) and the Economic Community of West Africa (ECOWAS)to take the issues concerning migration seriously by finding long lasting solutions to the challenges posed.
Lumumba advised the President of Ghana, Akufo-Addo to speak with the current AU Chairman,President Felix-Antoine Tshisekedi of Democratic Republic of Congo to address the issue of African migration.
This is just as participants called for the abolition of the Kafala Migrants Hiring System of Contract Signing practiced in the Middle East.
They spoke at the virtual event of the African Migration Summit 2021 organised by the Journalists International Forum for Migration (JIFORM) in partnership with NEKOTECH in Accra, the Ghanian capital .
According to him, “It is urgent that African Union and ECOWAS take issues of migration seriously, President Akufo-Addo should have conversation with the current AU Chair to deal with migration matter with all the seriousness it deserves.”
He argued that resolving issues of migration between Africans was critical to finding a lasting solution to migration problems confronting the continent’s migrants in the Middle East and Saudi Arabia.
Similarly, the Ghana’s Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration Minister, Shirley Ayorkor Botchway, while speaking at the August event contended that migration only becomes a good choice when African migrants secures decent work, opportunities and standard treatment in the Middle-East.
She listed the ingredients of decent work to include: respect for labour laws, promoting employment status, creating sustainable development and good labour welfare.
Also speaking, a member, AU Advisory Committee on Labour and Migration and Co-founder, Nekotech Center for Labour Migration Diplomacy, Dr. Princess Ocansey has advocated that African leaders should apply “Nekotech Decent Work Wheel” geared towards addressing emerging challenges of African migrants including abolishing the Kafala migrant hiring system of contract signing in the Middle-East.
In her words, “Nekotech Decent Work Wheel, includes ten keys such as Dialogue and agreement, Awareness, Cooperation, Independence, Safety, Law and Order, Quality Recruitment, Certification and Settlement, Financial Security, Return and Reintegration .”
She called on African leaders to ban unlicenced recruiting agencies and at the same create a conducive climate for the legally once to thrive in the interest of African migrants.
“Clamp down on recruitment agencies which are not licensed whilst creating an enabling environment for licensed ones to operate in the supreme interest of African migrants,”Ocansey appealed.
Contributing Ghana’s Director for Consular Affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, Dr. Senalor Yawlui , also supported the abolition of the Kafala Migrants Hiring System of Contract Signing in agreement with the Ocansey suggestion .
“There is urgent need to abolish Kafala migrants hiring system of contract signing which is almost servitude, human rights abuse urgent engagement with the Middle-East authorities to regulate recruitment agencies whilst tracking down unscrupulous agencies”.
The President of Journalists International Forum for Migration (JIFORM) Ajibola Abayomi tasked world leaders to proffer solutions to immediately address head-on issues concerning migration, which according to him has become a serious challenge to the world.
He added that the time to address it strategically is now.
