De Fabel van de illegaal 58, May/June 2003
Author: Jan Tas
Not stopping migration, but managing it is most important to the International Organization for Migration (IOM). Especially to the rich countries in Europe and North America it is of enormous economic importance to turn migration into an orderly business. The activities of IOM Netherlands are to be analyzed in that context.
Return and Emigration of Aliens from the Netherlands (REAN), is the name of the basic deportation program of the IOM. That program is meant for refugees from outside the EU, who have valid travel documents, who want to live in the Netherlands, who do not have a residence permit, who have not yet been deported by the immigration service IND and who cannot pay for their own "return". For these migrants the IOM arranges flight tickets and a "contribution to support them". The amount of this "contribution" depends on the residence status the migrant has in the Netherlands. The lower the status, the lower the "contribution". Undocumented single migrants can get a maximum of 135 euros, and when they still have an asylum procedure running they can get up to 225 euros. People who have a residence permit cannot join REAN, it says in the conditions. But in the official IOM statistics one can read that single refugees who do have a residence permit can in fact get the highest "contribution": 570 euros.
Reintegration?
The descriptions of various REAN programs show that refugees who have been in the Netherlands for a longer time, and who have a temporary residence permit, form an important target of the IOM. Look, for instance, at the special REAN-plus program for refugees from Iraq. Most of them were only given a temporary residence permit that lasted until 1998 when the government declared northern Iraq "safe". Then the permits were taken away from them. The local situation, however, made it very difficult for the ministry of Justice to actually deport them to northern Iraq. But after the current war, deportations will soon get on their way. That threat presents many refugees from Iraq with a devilish 'choice' now. Or they decide to wait for deportation, or they now swap their temporary residence permit for such a small IOM "contribution". The government really wants to get rid of them, it seems. All Iraqi refugees can get the highest "contribution" whatever their current status, and as a bonus they are also offered a one time "reintegration contribution" of 500 dollar.
This strategy is also used on Bosnian refugees. To get them to "voluntary return" the IOM in 1998, two years after the war in Bosnia had ended, founded the Fund to Assist the Re-installation of Refugees from the Netherlands to Bosnia Herzegovina (FARNN), also called the "reintegration funds Bosnia". That fund only targets Bosnian refugees that have arrived in the Netherlands before June 1st, 1997. But these are in fact the refugees who mostly do have residence permits. They now can trade their permit for a one time "contribution" of 2.268, 90 euro. Up till now 203 families have left, in three phases. Some 50 families have already been "selected" for the fourth phase.
Except for the "returns" the REAN program also manages the "resettling" of refugees. Some refugees who do not get permits for the Netherlands, are offered to the US, Canada, Australia or New Zealand. The last three countries of this list select the most 'useful' refugees on the basis of a system of points. They look at age, education and work experience. Because the Netherlands nowadays rejects almost all refugees, the IOM stimulates them to request "resettling" even when the Dutch asylum procedures have not yet finished.
Database
In Europe and North America the labor market continually asks for more worker migrants for a growing number of economic sectors. But the rest of the world also needs all kinds of workers. Organizations like the IOM are nowadays functioning more and more like international job agencies trying to supply the global demand for workers. IOM migration programs are therefore always attuned to the labor market. And as to be expected, the needs in the rich countries are considered most important.
Return of Qualified Afghans (RQA) is a program to get highly educated Afghans around the world to go back to help rebuilding that country. To get as close as possible to the Afghan refugees in the Netherlands, the IOM and the Dutch government have together established an "Afghanistan office". That office gives information on RQA to Afghan groups in the Netherlands. At the same time they inform Dutch organizations in Afghanistan on the possibilities of recruiting Afghan workers through the RQA program. They have also build an internet database to connect employers in Afghanistan to highly educated Afghans elsewhere. Afghans with the Dutch nationality or a lasting residence permit can in this way take a job in Afghanistan and come back afterwards. But to refugees with temporary residence permits, or those still in asylum procedures, participation in the project will for ever end their asylum procedures and their stay in the Netherlands. In this way the Dutch government en route gets rid of Afghan refugees.
Two paths
The IOM also educated some refugees before "returning" them "voluntary". That way they can be used back there in sectors that need them most. Education also promotes the humanitarian image of the IOM. Education and afterwards "voluntary return" sounds a lot better than jailing and deportation. This positive image opens doors to the IOM which remain closed to the immigration service IND. The schooling program of IOM Netherlands is called "Educated return". Together with state refugee organization COA and various schools around the country the IOM organizes "two paths courses" for refugees who still have an asylum procedure running. "Two paths" means that refugees are educated for work in the Netherlands and in their country of origin. The refugees are taught a lot about the IOM as well and about the possibilities of a job with their new education in their country of origin. Those who are lucky enough to be accepted as refugees, are at once ready for the labor market. They can immediately start doing the dirty work for the Dutch. For "educated return" is in fact a "short profession directed education". Keep in mind that the average asylum procedure takes long enough to finish a complete study at any university.
Brain drain
In November 2002 the IOM Netherlands has started to research the possibilities "of using migrants from Ghana to develop the medical sector in Ghana", because "one of the biggest problems this sector has to cope with in Ghana is the flowing away of medical personnel like doctors and nurses to abroad (brain drain)". This research takes place in the context of the international IOM program "Migration for Development in Africa" (MIDA). Goal of this program is "to stimulate Africans in the Diaspora to put their experience and networks to use for the development of their countries of origin". This sudden concern for the "development" of Africa is completely hypocritical. Brain drains like this are in fact organized by the IOM and others. They cause global knowledge to always flow in the direction of Europe and North America. The IOM, for instance, has programs to lure it-workers from all over the world to Germany, and another one to bring over 5.000 educated Albanian workers to Italy.(2)
Medical personnel from Ghana is seemingly considered inferior. Because at the same time the IOM works on the MIDA "return plans", Dutch hospitals import medical personnel from South Africa, The Philippines, Mexico and Russia. Polish nurses also evidently live up to "Dutch standards", because from 2003 to 2005 they are allowed to fill in vacancies in the Netherlands through the IOM project "Polish nurses in the Netherlands: development of competencies". Poland and the Netherlands agreed upon that program in 2002. The IOM will supervise the three organizations which are going to recruit the nurses. They will keep an eye on the "recruitment, selection, preparations, support and return", and the IOM stresses the importance of "employing, returning and reintegrating in the Polish labor market".
This type of short term contracts make it possible to import labor and simply dump the migrant workers again when they have becomes superfluous. That is cheaper for the government. Dutch employees have of course a right to social security when they are dumped. The "Polish nurse" program isn't the only IOM project to import labor to the Netherlands. The organization is working hard to chart the immigration to various economic sectors. Together with employer's organizations and others the IOM wants to find out "whether and in what ways it can support organized immigration of workers".
Notes