THE Fiji Immigration Department is addressing challenges related to fraudulent documentation and the potential for worker exploitation within its work permit system.
These issues were recently outlined by the department’s acting West manager, Salesi Cama, during a presentation on emerging trends in migration and mobility at a migrant workers workshop in Lautoka.
“Fiji is not like New Zealand and Australia where they issue visas prior to entry and that visa will also allow them to enter as well,” Mr Cama said.
“We have 100-something countries that are visa-exempt and when they apply for a visa, they apply for a visa outside our country, so when they enter our borders, we will issue them with permits.”
Mr Cama said the number of semi-skilled and unskilled workers entering the country had increased compared with skilled professionals.
“Last year, we issued over 6000 work permits and the top nationalities were Bangladeshi, Thais and Indonesians.”
Mr Cama said people from Bangladesh were usually construction workers while China and Indonesia nationals worked on fishing vessels.
He said a key challenge was the prevalence of fraudulent documents submitted by some foreign workers.
“We don’t have any licensors in order to control this recruitment from Bangladesh. However, we are trying our very best in terms of the processing part of the application where processing officers are trying their very best to ensure documents are genuine.
“So, one of the challenges is the large number of fraudulent documents being received from Bangladeshi workers.”
Mr Cama said the department’s compliance and assessment team was conducting audits of the permit process to identify areas for further improvement.
“So, in a case where a worker is working in a company without a paid work permit, the worker will be declared a prohibited immigrant, then he will be removed.
“If he breached the employment contract, but the work permits are valid, then one will just follow the cancellation process and that offence is a bit of a minor offence, but the serious offence is when a worker does not have a valid work permit.”
Mr Cama said the department had implemented a new data management system to enhance the efficiency of the work permit process.
“We are trying to establish a work permit committee which consists of Fiji Immigration, the Labour (Ministry of Labour and Workplace Relations) together with the Financial Intelligence Unit.”
