Overseas Employment Agency, Protector of Emigrants in Goa soon

Panaji, May 15 (UNI) The Commissioner for NRI affairs in Goa has urged the Union Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs to assist the island state in setting up ''Overseas Employment Agency (OAE)'' and ''Office of Protector of Emigrants(OPE)'' to help solve Goa NRI's in India and abroad at the earliest.

Disclosing to media persons here today, the Commissioner and former Union Minister Eduardo Faleiro said the proposed OAE to be managed by the state government, would save emigrants from exploitation by unscrupulous recruiting agents and foreign employees.

At the sametime, the OPE in Goa would help maids and persons with below XII standard qualification avoid going all the way to Mumbai office for emigration clearance, thus helping them avoid the harassment from the intermediaries.

There are, according to estimates, about 5 lakh Goans outside the state and half of them are in abroad. No database is however available with the Government though NRI Facilitation Cell, which was in vogue for long in Goa, promised to do the job earlier. Mr Faleiro, who had recently taken over the new office, said the Commissionerate had decided to publish the details of about 200 Goan origin victims of 1990-91 Iraq-Kuwait war whose compensation settlement claims had been approved by the UN Compensation Commission (UNCC) in Geneva.

The compensation however could not be paid with the victims addresses not available with the Union Ministry of External Affairs.

The claimants could thereafter contact the Special Kuwait Cell in the External Affairs Ministry in New Delhi for receiving the payments approved by the UNCC, he said.

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