*Foreign Workers & Unemployed Sri Lankan Citizens*
It is reported that there are 10,000 foreign workers on tourist visas currently working in Sri Lanka while scores more are working tagged to investment clauses that permit foreign workers to engage in employment in Sri Lanka. If 10,000 job vacancies have been occupied by foreign citizens arriving as ‘tourists’ it raises the question why these 10,000 jobs could not have gone to Sri Lankan citizens when unemployment is hovering at 4.4%? More importantly, it raises the question of why Sri Lanka employers have allowed ‘tourists’ to work in Sri Lanka and why Sri Lankan authorities watched while 10,000 ‘tourist visa’ holders are engaged in employment. Generally people arriving on ‘tourist visa’ come to visit and see the country not to engage in employment! *Foreign investments / Foreign ‘Professionals’* Tourists working in Sri Lanka may benefit the companies that are happy not to pay taxes, lodger that are happy to rent out for thousands more than they would gain otherwise but where does this illpractice get the country? Not very far. As for drawing foreign professionals into the working cadre of Sri Lanka, the arguments that local authorities in charge of foreign investments give to explain the scenario is that foreign investments generally come with a clause that entitles foreign companies to bring foreign workers. These foreign workers claim to be those who fill a dearth. In other words they are brought in for areas that there are no local experts. Loopholes in this scenario often lie in the terminologies used. There are many ways people can show there are no professionals in Sri Lanka. While there are barbers in Sri Lanka companies could use a fancy word that would describe the same work a barber does but will local authorities go the length to decipher exactly what type of ‘professionalism’ is not available in Sri Lanka for foreigners to be brought in? How many of Sri Lanka’s public officials would care to ask why jobs should not go to locals instead of bringing in foreign workers? Seeing the scores of foreign workers and families presently living in urban and even outskirts of Colombo and other cities around Sri Lanka we can but ask how many loopholes have been breached! Calculate this in to long term would this end up Sri Lankans functioning as slaves to foreigners inside their own country? Why do Sri Lankan’s not wish to be their own bosses instead of working for foreign natives inside their own turf? *Sri Lankan skilled workers go overseas – Foreign workers employed in Sri Lanka* In the meanwhile, Sri Lankan skilled workers seek employment abroad in a bid to improve their income though that income may be higher than what they can earn in Sri Lanka but in reality it is far lower than what someone from the country they are working in would be given. In the MNC sector especially, foreign workers holding senior positions are often paid remarkable salaries but on top of the salary they are entitled to a host of luxuries that include renting plush homes, international schools for children, club membership, entertainment etc. A local given the same position would not be lucky to secure the same remunerations. In the hotel industry especially, it is again a very white dominated industry. Not many Asians or Africans can find their way right to the top posts. Same can be said of banking industry as well though examples are given naming Indians in top slots but forgetting that they are Indian by name only as they are very much holding foreign passports and living and thinking as the white dominated society in which they have chosen to belong. Describing them as ‘Indian’ is only a cosmetic attempt to show that jobs are given to non-whites. *‘Working’ Tourists* How many western nations allow tourists to work? If not, why should Sri Lanka make an exception to the rule? What is the country getting by allowing tourists to work when tax is deducted on foreign salaries only after 6months and that only the categories that the authorities permit to work in Sri Lanka. Most of the MNCs ensure they give contracts for 6month renewable and then they replace with a new member thus leaving the entire salary going out of the country. We are well aware that the influx of immigration began for menial jobs which the Western natives were lethargic to do preferring to live off their dole. Today, in most western countries the immigrants are engaged in several jobs while natives bemoan they are unemployed but do little to change that scenario. In the US there are 55million unemployed Americans while there are 40million immigrants of which 28% are illegal immigrants. Of the 40million, 23 percent of immigrants and their U.S.-born children (under 18) are said to live in poverty. *Influx of Maldivians to Sri Lanka* The excuse of Maldives going underground was reason enough for President J R Jayawardena to open Sri Lanka’s doors for Maldivians to arrive and live in Sri Lanka. In 30 years nothing has happened to Maldives but there are over 300,000 Maldivians currently working, educating their children and living in Sri Lanka. Areas have been virtually taken over by brokers securing rented households exclusively for Maldivians creating ghettos of Maldivians willing to pay any price since they are renting out their homes in Maldives to live in Sri Lanka. Moreover, there are many now marrying Sri Lankan women – both Muslim and non-Muslim and thus indirectly securing land for themselves too. Calculate that into future and the Muslim 4-women marriage and multiple children to realize the change in demography for Sri Lanka. These aspects surely could not have escaped the attention of the country’s leaders and their supposed coterie of advisors. Leaders may also like to look up voter mentality to realize that no sooner demography does change they would face the grim reality that there are no more Buddhists to vote them into power! The grim reality in this is that there is no reciprocity. Maldives does not allow citizenship to anyone but Muslims. No one can take a non-Islamic religious relic or picture even to Maldives. Those that do will have it destroyed in front of their faces at the airport itself. The pre-Islamic Buddhist history of Maldives has been completely erased from its history books, vandalisms continue to take place to destroy the museum replicas and other historic monuments of the Buddhist history of Maldives were anything dug throughout Maldives islands continue to have some Buddhist link. Yet, not a hum is said even in opposition of the situation from anyone in Sri Lanka not even the External Affairs Ministry or Minister. *Foreign presence and value systems* While development does have its merits it behoves leaders not to compromise the country’s ethos and value system simply to be thought in equal terms to the West. Why should we degrade the civilizational culture of the country simply to be benchmarked by Western standards. Do we need to copy all that the West does to be accepted by them? Should we not be proud of our own culture and continue to protect and foster it? Does development mean that we are ready to forsake the culture and identity we have had passed down from generation to generation or simply use it as a cosmetic exercise when serenading foreign guests? *Foreign ‘tourists’ must see Asian Sri Lanka not a replica of the West* Let us also make clear that visitors in particular those that arrive as ‘tourists’ come to the ancient heritage, culture and other places of historical value. Why should they pay to travel thousands of miles to eat and live just like they do in their own environment? For business people of course, their meetings often being in Colombo and major cities their stay is often confined to 5 star hotels where they look for all the amenities they find in the West. However, for tourists while the general amenities must be of good standard they would enjoy the real Sri Lankan atmosphere rather than live in the same compartments/hotel rooms that they would find in their own countries. Therefore, we need to create the atmosphere of generating tourists aligned to what our culture and heritage is all about and to do that our officials starting from Ministry to public needs to be proud and appreciate that culture. We can but ask how many of the external affairs ministry know even to recite the national anthem or are able to hold a conversation on the history of Sri Lanka. *Advantage of investments* It is also a good time to seriously evaluate the exact impact of the investments and the return on investment to the country. The company’s initially investing does promise to put on the table a large sum of money for numerous tax concessions and other tax holidays and benefits and in calculating these how beneficial is the exact deal? In many instances foreign company’s that have set up in Sri Lanka end up diverting money out of the country using various ‘administrative/IT and technical fees’ charged to the local company from the global networks and these fees can never be questioned. Therefore, apart from paying for salary of local employees is the country really benefiting and do we have a country-concerned public body that can evaluate these investments for they may bring tons of commissions for those striking the deal but long term does it get the country anywhere for often these multinational companies are linked in some way to foreign governments that attempt to strike regime change using companies as camouflage? There is also an increase in arrests of foreign travelers involved in illegal activity which range from narcotics, stealing religious artifacts, gems, human smuggling etc. The arrests of foreigners overstaying is also posing a problem and demands that a system needs to be set in place to ensure that the country is aware of the foreign passport holders coming into the country and those leaving to the deadline given. A system should be in place to tabulate foreign passport holders whose visas are to expire at a certain date and these must be checked with airport immigration to ensure that they have afterall left the country. If not, authorities must be able to locate them and take legal action according to the country’s laws. Returning to the question of employment, with the numerous public and private training programs in place and people attempting to secure additional qualifications over and above their educational qualification it would be unfair to hand jobs over to foreign workers without allowing our own people to be employed first. Additionally, natives must also realize that simply because they obtain a degree the government is not beholden to secure jobs for them. As adults they must carve their own future. However, there is no requirement for Sri Lanka’s to be employed under foreigners if they have the talent to run their own firms and people to work in them. We need to be more confident in our own people and their abilities and capabilities and help those who can leverage their talents to levels of requirement. What Sri Lanka’s leaders need to ponder about is the avenues that ‘foreign workers’ have to manipulate the systems which include marriage, purchasing property (by default using local proxies), securing land illicitly etc. These are areas that Sri Lanka will have problems in future if authorities are not bold enough to take action now itself and already we see live examples of areas being breached. All these help add up to people’s woes and when external elements get whiff of areas they can manipulate the Government will soon discover they have created avenues for enemies to linger and more importantly they have ignored the warnings given. Eventually the headaches once piled will become a national security concern for the country. *Shenali D Waduge* -- තෙරුවන් සරණයි ! -- If You Unable to read SINHALA, http://www.siyabas.lk/sinhala_how_to_install.html ================================== E-MailSriLanka E-Mail Group ================================== http://groups.google.com/group/emailsrilanka මෙම පණිවිඩය ඔබට ලැබෙන්නේ ඔබගේ ඊමේල් ලිපිනය ඊමේල් ශ්රීලංකා හි සාමාජිකත්වය ලබා ඇති නිසාය. ඊමේල් ශ්රීලංකා සමුහයෙන් ඉවත් වීම සදහා. To UNSUBSCRIBE from this E-Mail Group, send email to : [email protected] ================================== ඊමේල් ශ්රීලංකා සමූහයට ඇතුලත් වීම සදහා. To SUBSCRIBE to this E-Mail Group, [email protected] OR Go to, http://groups.google.lk/group/emailsrilanka/boxsubscribe ================================= For Invite Members ඊමේල් ශ්රීලංකා වෙත ඹබගේ යහලුවන්ගේ ඊමේල් ලිපින හදුන්වාදීම සදහා http://groups.google.com/group/emailsrilanka/members_invite ............................ බුදු සසුන බැබලේවා ! --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "ඊමේල් ශ්රීලංකා" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
