Jobseekers in trouble as TUTH fails to provide medical reports on time

PRABHAKAR GHIMIRE

KATHMANDU, Nov 26: Around 200 Nepali jobseekers could not re-apply for Korean jobs under the Employment Permit System (EPS) as per the schedule after Tribhuwan University Teaching Hospital (TUTH), one of the five designated hospitals, failed to provide medical reports for them on Sunday.

A high level source at the Department of Foreign Employment (DoFE) said only 107 job-seekers registered their applications along with their fresh medical reports which were prepared by other designated hospitals.

“We had set a target to re-register the applications from around 350 job aspirants today (Sunday). Unfortunately, TUTH failed to provide medical reports to the candidates leaving them in lurch, although other designated hospitals are making reports in time,” the source told Republica.


In the first phase, the government have assigned TUTH to prepare reports for 200 candidates, Civil Servant Hospital (CSH) for 50, Shukraraj Tropical and Infectious Disease Hospital (STIDH) for 50, Nepal-Korea Friendship Hospital (NKFH) for 250 and Patan Hospital (PH) for 250 who are re-trying their hands for EPS jobs.

Going against the agreement with the Ministry of Labor and Employment (MoLE), the TUTH failed to prepare the medical reports leaving at least 200 aspirants in crisis.

“We are living in a lodge waiting for our medical reports from TUTH which has failed to provide the report today (Sunday). TUTH officials said we have to wait until Wednesday, which means we had to wait unnecessarily for three more days for the reports,” Chet Maya Gurung of Waling of Syangja told Republica on Sunday. Along with her six friends she had her health checked in TUTH on Thursday.

Pratap Narayan Sah, head of the General Practice and Emergency Department of TUTH said that the preparation of medical report in time was difficult due to limited number of technical staffs, and recent changes in Medical Superintendent in TUTH, among others.

“Though we have limited staffs to prepare medical reports, we are trying to provide the report to the candidates from Wednesday,” Sah told Republica.

The South Korean government had recently sent names of around 5,700 candidates out of around 9,000 candidates who failed to get jobs under EPS- a scheme announced by the Korean government to local employers to hire foreigners to fulfill the deficit of workforce- to reapply at EPS-Nepal office to retain their candidature in job roster of Human Resource Department (HRD) of Korea.

HRD Korea has been randomly selecting the names from the job rosters to call for re-registrations of the application.

Situation to reregister the applications of those already included in the job roster emerged as their medical reports, which is valid for a year, has either expired or are expiring soon.

As per the existing provision, names of candidates will be de-registered from the roster once their medical reports´ validity expires. Those, who want to qualify for EPS jobs again, have to pass medical test and refill the job application at EPS Nepal Office.

Data shows that 15,500 youths registered in HRD´s job roster after qualifying through the Test of Proficiency in Korea (TOPIK)- Korean language test and heath check up to vie for Korean jobs in 2011. However, only 6,039 of them have actually signed labor contracts, meaning around 9,000 candidates would have to re-register.