Vietnam cracks down on illegal workers
After Malaysia, the Vietnamese government has tightened the screws further on foreign workers and people employing them by making it mandatory to get annual approval from local authorities. A decree to take effect on November 1, 2013, will continue to make it mandatory for employers to prove that they require foreign workers and that Vietnamese cannot replace them.
The decree also scraps a provision allowing foreign manual labourers to work in Vietnam for less than three months without a work permit. This privilege will henceforth be extended only to those who come to handle complicated technical or technological issues.
Another major change reduces the validity of work permits from three to two years. Notably, for the first time foreign workers found without work permits will be deported within 15 days.
There are thousands of illegal foreign workers at construction sites across Vietnam, according to a government report. Many of them are Chinese because Chinese state-owned construction companies are winning many bids in Vietnam to build power plants, factories, railroads, highways, subway lines and stadiums and prefer to bring their own workers.
Furthermore, medical clinics in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi have been fined for various violations, including the employment of unlicensed Chinese doctors. An increasing number of African nationals have also been caught overstaying their 15-day visa to find jobs in Vietnam or even committing crimes like robberies and drug trading, the government report said.
Now employers will have to get approval from the chairman of provincial people’s committees to hire foreign workers in the respective localities. They then have to complete all the formalities required by the labour ministry and other agencies just as before.
Those added to the category are teachers at foreign institutions sent to work in international schools in Vietnam managed by foreign agencies, volunteers, those with master’s degrees and advising, teaching or researching at Vietnamese tertiary or vocational institutions for a maximum of one month, and foreign workers who come here under international agreements to which state agencies are a signatory.
As of July 2012, there were 77,087 foreign workers in Vietnam, 24,455 of them without work permits. They were from more than 60 countries, 58 per cent of them being Asians, 28.5 per cent Europeans and the rest from other places.
After Malaysia, the Vietnamese government has tightened the screws further on foreign workers and people employing them by making it mandatory to get annual approval from local authorities. A decree to take effect on November 1, 2013, will continue to make it mandatory for employers to prove that they require foreign workers and that Vietnamese cannot replace them. The decree also scraps a provision allowing foreign manual labourers to work in Vietnam for less than three months without a work permit. This privilege will henceforth be extended only to those who come to handle complicated technical or technological issues. Another...
After Malaysia, the Vietnamese government has tightened the screws further on foreign workers and people employing them by making it mandatory to get annual approval from local authorities. A decree to take effect on November 1, 2013, will continue to make it mandatory for employers to prove that they require foreign workers and that Vietnamese cannot replace them.
The decree also scraps a provision allowing foreign manual labourers to work in Vietnam for less than three months without a work permit. This privilege will henceforth be extended only to those who come to handle complicated technical or technological issues.
Another major change reduces the validity of work permits from three to two years. Notably, for the first time foreign workers found without work permits will be deported within 15 days.
There are thousands of illegal foreign workers at construction sites across Vietnam, according to a government report. Many of them are Chinese because Chinese state-owned construction companies are winning many bids in Vietnam to build power plants, factories, railroads, highways, subway lines and stadiums and prefer to bring their own workers.
Furthermore, medical clinics in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi have been fined for various violations, including the employment of unlicensed Chinese doctors. An increasing number of African nationals have also been caught overstaying their 15-day visa to find jobs in Vietnam or even committing crimes like robberies and drug trading, the government report said.
Now employers will have to get approval from the chairman of provincial people’s committees to hire foreign workers in the respective localities. They then have to complete all the formalities required by the labour ministry and other agencies just as before.
Those added to the category are teachers at foreign institutions sent to work in international schools in Vietnam managed by foreign agencies, volunteers, those with master’s degrees and advising, teaching or researching at Vietnamese tertiary or vocational institutions for a maximum of one month, and foreign workers who come here under international agreements to which state agencies are a signatory.
As of July 2012, there were 77,087 foreign workers in Vietnam, 24,455 of them without work permits. They were from more than 60 countries, 58 per cent of them being Asians, 28.5 per cent Europeans and the rest from other places.
