Job Agencies And Workers Hail New Employment Scheme
By Rosli Abidin Yahya

Bandar Seri Begawan - The licensing of employment agencies in Brunei has been lauded as an effort that will crack down on illegal recruiters who prey on desperate foreign workers looking for employment here.

Applicants of employment agencies here said the direct-hiring scheme that was previously allowed had become a root of illegal recruitment.

A number of prospective local proprietors of employment agencies talked to the Bulletin after eight foreigners had reportedly fallen victim to illegal recruitments in their own country recently.

Three of them returned home Thursday evening while three others had departed to their country of origin earlier on. Another two managed to secure employment here.

The eight were sent to Brunei on social visit passes by an illegal recruiter to whom they paid a hefty sum of processing fees.

On their arrival, the prospective workers found out that there were no such jobs waiting for them here and that they had to renew their social visit passes every now and then until they would be required to leave Brunei and go back to their country of origin.

Before the introduction of employment agencies, foreign workers were hired directly by employers here.

They added with the licensing of recruitment agencies, the doors of foreign recruiters to cheat innocent workers are narrowed but not totally shut.

They said it is now up to the foreign workers now to check the name of recruitment agency against the list of agencies to verify authenticity and avoid being cheated by illegal recruiters. -- Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin

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