Rawalpindi, (Parliament Times) : Overseas Employment Promoters have appealed to the Prime Minister Imran Khan to take a personal interest in lifting restrictions on the employment of Pakistani workers in the UAE, saying as a result of these restrictions, about 1000 Pakistanis are losing their jobs every day coupled with a huge loss of billions of dollars to national economy.
OEPs Association put this demand to P.M. Imran
Khan and his government during a meeting held here in the office of Knight
Human Management (KHM) Shalaan Pakistan office with Chief Executive Officer of
KHM Mr. Khalid Nawaz in chair on Thursday. Representatives of OEPs showed
grave concern over the prolonging ban on visas by UEA government for
Pakistanis. They were of the view that the skilled and unskilled labour force
working in UAE contributed a major share of foreign exchange in national
economy which is badly effecting due to this ban.
The UAE is the second largest source of jobs and valuable foreign exchange for Pakistanis, the promoters said. “Unemployment is also rising in all cities within Pakistan due
to the restrictions, as the decline in demand for overseas jobs has also
severely affected promoters working at the national level”, they added saying
that we have no option but to refuse our employees to stay more. Khalid
Nawaz said that 1.3 million Pakistanis during the last five years have found jobs
in the UAE and in 2019 alone, Pakistani expatriates in UAE sent more than 5
billion dollars to their country.
Khalid Nawaz said that during the financial year 2020-21, Pakistani migrants working in the UAE were expected to generate 6 billion dollars in foreign exchange in the country’s
economy, but due to the sanctions, it would meet a sharp decline. “If the
government does not take immediate steps to lift these sanctions imposed by the
UAE, not only will unemployment rise in the country, but our foreign exchange
reserves will also decrease irreparably”, he mentioned.
He said that tens of thousands of workers were currently waiting for the UAE to lift sanctions so that they could go back to their work place and send valuable foreign exchange to their country, as well as reduce unemployment. He further said that India is
currently reaping the full benefits of the ban on Pakistani workers and
Overseas Employment Promoters in Pakistan are also trailing down job
opportunities for locals resulting in thousands of people working with them are
losing their employment.
