The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress of Nigeria(TUC) with the technical support of the International Labour Organisation(ILO) is set to develop a roadmap on a new policy on labour migration.
Speaking at a two-day consultative workshop, ILO Senior Technical Specialist on Workers’ Activities, Abuja Office, Inviolata Chinyangarara, said the Trade Union Labour Migration Policy is a pathway for trade unions to contributes to the achievements of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that target labour migration.
According to her, ILO statistics showed an upward trend of outgoing and incoming migrants within the Nigerian borders.
“Some coming in are counted because they come through regular process, airports and other ports of entries but the majority that are vulnerable that in precarious situation are those that are coming through irregular means.
“But ILO statistics also show that they the trends are increasing, that is outgoing and income migrants, particularly within the Nigerian borders, ’’she said.
She said that labour migration was triggered by social, political and economic issues such as climate indices on labour migration, disasters, pandemics and other crisis that triggered people to move.
The labour leader also said “our statistics also shows that largely in Africa, people are moving for economic reasons, particularly the young men and women.”
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She identified the sectors highly hit by migration to include health and construction sectors, cross borders traders and domestic service sectors, saying they “are highly mobile.”
She said there was brain-drain of highly skilled medical personnel and others leaving the shores African countries to get better jobs in neighbouring countries.
“That is why the ILO has come up with a global International Standards that is protecting and promoting the rights of domestic workers, that is Convention 189,’’she said.
Chinyangarara said the ILO was collaborating with the tripartite constituency in Nigeria on issues of decent work, particularly on labour migration governance, to ensure the promotion of rights of migrants, among others.
Chinyangarara said the Trade Union Labour Migration Policy was one way that the trade unions could contribute to the implementation of the national Labour Migration Policy.
According to her, the Labour Migrations Policy had become imperative as migration had become a major challenge in Africa for young men and women as they travelled through irregular processes.
“After this workshop, we are hoping to come up with a process that will then define the milestones for Labour Migrations Policy.
“We hope to come up with a steering committee that will be made up from NLC, TUC that will then define if they want to do development of Labour Migration Policy.
“That is through consulting or on their own in-housing knowledge expertise to develop this process, ’’she said.
NLC Desk Officer on Migration, Comrade Eustace James said the workshop which is the first of its kind would help design a roadmap for the development of Trade Union policy on Labour Migration in Nigeria.
Eustace said there were two policies that were already frameworks for migration governance in Nigeria, which include the National Policy on Labour Migration adopted by the Federal Executive Council in 2014 and the National Migration Policy adopted in 2015.
