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Government and genuine recruitment agencies working on migration have been urged to collaborate to flush out all illegal recruitment agencies in the country as a way of safeguarding potential migrants from falling prey to their unscrupulous activities.

Franklin Owusu Ansah, Deputy General Secretary, Health Services of the Workers’ Union of the Trades Union Congress (TUC), who made the call, says they must put their resources to work to ensure that all recruitment agencies are registered with the labour department.

“Some recruitment agencies in the system have not registered with the labour department and these agencies promise people jobs outside Ghana that are non-existent. Because they take so much money from these individuals, they promise them the job and the only thing they do is to get them visas and take them to the countries, leaving them to their fate,” he stressed.

Owusu Ansah, who was speaking to The Finder on the sidelines of a press conference organised by the Trades Union Migration Network (ATUMNET) to look at fair recruitment in relation to labour migration, advised that adequate information should be made available to potential migrants before they embark on any journey.

Dr Kennedy Achakama, a focal person of ATUMNET in Ghana, addressing the press on behalf of ATUMNET, pointed out that African governments must develop and improve recruitment agency regulations in ways that will improve and not distort or eclipse employment relationships, as well as deepen labour employment and relations.

The network called on African trade unions to scale up their advocacy on effective labour inspection regimes and practices, as well as demand for stiffer sanctions against unfair labour employment and relations practices.

“We will continue to work with our counterparts to ensure that pro-rights global migration governance is attained. This is what we are doing within the UN Global Compact on Safe, Fair and Orderly migration process,” he noted.

According to the network, African youth continue to embark on desperate journeys across the Sahara Deserts and the Mediterranean Seas because of pervasive poverty, burgeoning unemployment and the paucity of public service delivery, as well as voluntarily seeking and availing themselves to human smugglers and traffickers in their quest for economic survival and better life.

The ATUMNET is a platform for all national trade union organisations in the 52 of the 55 African countries affiliated to the African Regional Organisation of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC-Africa) and are engaged on migration issues.

The network gathered in Accra for a two-day conference with support of Friedrich Ebert Stiftung Foundation (FES), and as part of their meeting made copies available of a book on pre-decision and information guide for potential migrants.