LILONGWE (MaraviPost) — Henry Mussa, Malawi’s new labour minister has spoken down the labour export deal that was initiated by former Pres Joyce Banda government saying it was crap.
The labour export initiative was former ruling People’s Party (PP) initiative that aimed at alleviating unemployment challenges facing the youth in the country.
The controversial initiative saw some of the youths being earmarked to for general duties to Korea, Dubai and Japan according to the then labour minister Grace Maseko.
However reports indicate that some of the youths that went to middle east countries like Korea have already regretted to have gone there as they are subjected to harsh labour conditions thus according to Malawi Congress of Trade Unions officials.
Speaking in an interview with MaraviPost, the new Minister of Labour Henry Mussa said that the initiative was “a waste of time and resources as it is not in the best interest of the country’s development agenda.”
Mussa said the current administration will work on finding local labour and unemployment solutions for the youth than letting them to get exploited abroad.
“Is there anything that they could be doing there than what they could be doing in Malawi? When you look at some of them that have been hired, you could see that the majority of them are casual labourours and this ministry will now be elevated to become one of the priority ministries to address the job creation issues, we have to create jobs for our people” said Mussa.
The labour export initiative faced stiff resistance from labour activists and the general public who felt that citizens would be abused while working in foreign land but the former Joyce Banda administration remained adamant to implement the initiative.
However Mussa did not elaborate on what will be the way forward for those that are already abroad working as beneficiaries of the initiative.
