Bonded labour project to be expanded

Critic says reports about current project have not been provided.

LAHORE:

The 6-year Project EBLIK (Elimination of Bonded Labour in Brick Kilns) which was initiated in Lahore and Kasur four years back, is expected to be replicated in four more districts of Punjab next year.

In the next phase, it is hoped to deal with more than 650 brick kilns.

The project, proposed by the Centre for the Improvement of Working Conditions and Environment (CIWCE), is to be an extended replication of the EBLICK project.

CIWCE director Saeed Awan told The Express Tribune the proposal had been sent to the Punjab government to extend the EBLICK project to Rawalpindi, Faisalabad, Bahawalpur and Sargodha districts. According to the Labour and Human Resources Department, there are 658 registered brick kilns in the targeted districts. The project hopes to improve the lives of more than 95,000 brick kiln workers. The five-year project is to be monitored and accounted for by the Labour and Human Resource Department. The CIWCE team hopes that the Rs195 million project will be included in the Annual Development Programme in March 2012.

The CIWCE has been associated with the project for four years in Lahore and Kasur. The Punjab government has so far provided Rs123 million for it.

With two more years till the completion of the EBLICK projects in Lahore and Kasur, the Labour and Human Resource Department assessments reveal that all 200 Non Formal Education (NFE) centres proposed for the areas in 2008 have been established. More than 6,800 labourers are already enrolled at the learning centres. The centres had originally targeted to help 7,000 workers.

The project was expected to facilitate issuance of CNICs for more than 15,000 workers but so far has been successful in only 5,000 cases. Awan identified the provision of ID cards as a ‘fundamental issue’ that needed to be addressed. “These workers need an identity card to benefit from any social safety net,” he said.

“The micro-credit schemes provided under this project do not free the workers of debt. The government is now taking the role of lender instead of the employer,” said Bonded Labour Liberation Front general secretary Ghulam Fatima. She said the CIWCE had failed to publish reports on the progress of the current project. She claimed that Rs1,000,000 had been allocated for the rehabilitation of workers but nothing had been done in this regard. Fatima said she was sceptical of the extension of the projects to other districts.

“All we ask of them is to identify the brick kilns where money has been given so that we may actually see and account for it,” Fatima added.

In a recent meeting between CIWCE and the International Labour Organisation (ILO), which has been assisting the Punjab government in these projects, areas of improvement under the project were identified.

ILO National Project Coordinator of Strengthening the Law Responses and Action Against Bonded Labour in Pakistan, Mohammad Binyameen, said though the project was providing veterinary services, it failed to address the health issues for brick kiln workers. He added that the ILO helped the government in launching of the 200 NFEs in Lahore and Kasur. Binyameen added that the EBLICK projects had been conceived under the ILO’s project, Promoting the Elimination of Bonded Labour in Pakistan (PEBLIP). Incorporating these concerns, the new EBLICK project will engage NGOs in the provision of education, health and hygiene awareness for brick kiln workers and registration of child births, he added. The new project includes promotion of model contracts between employers and the workers. Binyameen stressed that it was vital to take brick kiln owners on board on these model contracts.

Binyameen said it was the first time the Punjab government had spent so much money on projects working for abolishing bonded labour. “If the government puts in money, the project has enough credibility to achieve its goals,” Binyameen said.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 27^th, 2011.