Selection for women May 24-30

The Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training (BMET) yesterday asked females seeking jobs as domestic helps in Saudi Arabia to bring necessary documents and get selected through 42 district manpower offices from May 24 to 30.

Through an advertisement, the BMET said the applicants, aged between 25 and 45 years, must go to their respective manpower offices where boards would make the selections.

The documents include 12 copies of passport size photographs, machine readable passport or National Identity Card or birth certificate, and a citizenship certificate attested by the respective union parishad chairman or member.

No money will have to be spent as visa fee and air travel, says the ad, adding that 114 private Bangladeshi recruiting agencies would be involved.

On Thursday, Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment Minister Khandker Mosharraf Hossain announced that Saudi Arabia would hire 20,000 female Bangladeshis as domestic helps before Ramadan.

"A worker will be paid 800 Saudi Riyal, equivalent to Tk 16,000, a month," he told journalists in the capital's Probashi Kalayan Bhaban after holding a meeting with a visiting Saudi delegation.

A ministry official said around 10,000 visas have already been issued from the Saudi labour ministry through private recruiting agencies of both countries.

However, only 3,100 females have registered online with the BMET following a deal Dhaka and Riyadh inked on February 10 for 12 types of workers such as domestic helps, drivers, housekeepers, security guards and gardeners.