People attending the Seminar Photo: Arntai (SHAN)Officials from Thailand’s labor ministry, backed by those who have successfully completed the process, again urged migrant workers in Chiangmai to undergo the still controversial national verification process yesterday.
Of more than 66,000 registered migrant workers in Chiangmai, 43,782 or roughly two-thirds, have submitted their completed national verification forms, said Ms Phanthila Kaewboonruang of Chiangmai’s employment office told around 100 workers who attended the seminar at the Chiangmai University.
Out of the said 43,782, 74 have received their passports and 1,182 have been approved.
The cost of getting a passport is B 4,000 ($ 124), excluding travel and accommodation, according to the officials:
- Visa B 500
- Health check B 600
- Social Insurance B 1,900
- Work permit B 1,000
About half of the participants have applied for passports. The remaining half said they had yet to apply, as most of them had fled Burma during the 1996-1998 forced relocations of 1,500 villages in Southern and Eastern Shan State. “Even before that we did not have household registers, let alone ID cards,” one participant told SHAN.
The Human Rights Development Foundation (HRDF), that had facilitated the seminar, said it would be sending a 5 point proposal to the Thai Government:
- To extend the 28 February 2010 deadline for submission of completed national verification forms
- To do away with the broker system
- To set up Burma’s national verification offices where the migrant workers are
- To launch greater publicity campaign among the workers
- To allow unregistered workers to register
Chiangmai alone is said to have more than 100,000 unregistered workers. There are eastimatedly more than 2 million migrants from Burma in Thailand.
Source :http://shanland.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2903:remaining-migrant-workers-urged-to-go-through-national-verification-process&catid=93:general&Itemid=291
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