By Gezim Kasapolli
On
any given day, if you happen to stop in the vicinity of the old railway station
in Prishtina… in just a few short seconds you will be surrounded by unemployed
men who area waiting in desperation to be hired for odd jobs.
These
so-called day laborers usually wait the entire day with the hope that by the
end of the day they would have earned a few euros in order to feed their
families.
Hello
and welcome this is UNMIK on Air,
Unemployment
is at the forefront of problems most Kosovans wrestle with on a daily basis…
and the instability of the local economy and the lack of job opportunities
threatens to make this problem even more critical in the near future.
[According
to the latest statistics of the Kosovo Office for Statistics in the Ministry of
Labor and Social Welfare there are 291,409 registered unemployed in Kosovo of
which 132,987 are women.]
One of the newer phenomenon to emerge since 1999 in
Kosovo is the appearance of day laborers.
The lack of job opportunities whether it is within one’s own profession
or not, forces most of these young men to do whatever it takes just so to earn
some money and survive. These day
laborers are mostly hired for construction tasks, cleaning, or to move heavy
objects from one place to another.
Before
the 1999 conflict, Afrim Mejzinolli was employed at the Feronikel factory in
Gllogoc. Now 40-year-old Mejzinolli stands on the same corner of Agim Ramadani every day
for the past 4 years hoping to earn as little as little as 10 euros each day:
Mejzinolli
“I do this because I have no other job and because I have to support 10 members of my family. I have nothing else to do and I am forced to go out here hoping that I will earn something…I have to.”
Hafiz
Leka, Head of Employment Division in the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare
says the government is aware of the day laborer trend but to date they haven’t
been able to assess how many of these so-called “physical workers” exist. Even so, says Leka, the first thing he
urges the people of Kosovo to do is to register with the Ministry if one is
unemployed:
Leka
“The Ministry of Labor is aware of the phenomenon of people selling their working powers to certain points of the market. However, for the moment we do not know if they applied in municipal offices for employment or regional employment centers. We have our institutions in which we offer services for job seekers who have registered in our municipal offices and regional centers. Firstly we register them, give them advice and guide them to become more professional or to join certain training courses. Concerning those who sell their working power for the time being we cannot do anything.”
Day
laborers in Kosovo are not simply just the unemployed, but include graduates of
higher education. Sami Havolli, a
33-year-old from Prishtina graduated in economy from Peja High
School/College. After years of
searching for a job in his profession with no success, Havolli was forced to
turn to what he says was his only possible solution-- to become a day laborer.
Havolli
“I have to do this for two years now because I’m unemployed. I have four members of the family, two children and I support them with what I do here. It is very hard because sometimes it happens that you cannot earn anything for a week.”
The
problem of an educated workforce that is unemployed has not gone unnoticed by
the Ministry either and according to Leka this issue goes to the core of
Kosovo’s overall system. The Ministry is currently developing a long-term
strategy to deal with this situation adds Leka:
Leka
“This
definitely makes this social problem even deeper because a person with a higher
education who goes out and sells himself is a blow for the education system
itself because it is shown as incompetent. The systems are obliged and they
should deal with the problem of unemployment of this category and other
categories no matter their qualification because those who are qualified should
be systemized, those unqualified and uneducated should be educated in order to
be able to be absorbed into the job market.”
The
general feeling within the population is that the problem of unemployment is
far from being resolved. In a
post-conflict society, the time for economic reconstruction, and in the case of
Kosovo, economic transition looks to be a lengthy process.
And
that is all for this edition of UNMIK on air, thanks for listening and stay
tuned for more.