Jailed in Tanzania
Repatriation of trafficked Bangladeshis demanded
Relatives of 19 Bangladeshi jobseekers allegedly trafficked to and then jailed in Tanzania last year staged a sit-in in front of the capital's Bureau of Manpower Employment and Training (BMET) yesterday demanding their repatriation.
Illegal brokers had promised the victims jobs in South Africa in exchange for huge sums of money, they said.
But the men were taken to Uganda and Kenya and finally abandoned in Tanzania. The East African country had jailed them for not being able to produce any travel documents, they added.
“During our sit-in in Kakrail, a BMET official named Selim Reza arrived and told us to submit an application over our demands. We complied,” said Amran Fakir, father of one victim, Mohammad Russel of Gazipur.
In early May, BMET had said if the relatives could provide the Tk 89,000 needed to repatriate each of the victims, they could bring these men home.
“We hope the bureau is considering the repatriation at its own cost,” said Amran.
At a press conference on May 31, Larburu Khatun, mother of one victim, Biltu Miah, said a local broker, Shahabuddin, in collusion with a recruiting agency, Raj Overseas, took Tk 9 lakh from her son to send him to South Africa.
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