Government announces plan to legalize migrant workers
April 30th, 2013 (InsideCostaRica.com) The Ministry of Labor announced yesterday the launch of a special system to document migrant agriculture, domestic, and construction workers in the country.
Over the course of three months, authorities hope to document hundreds of workers and give them legal status in the country, thus forcing the companies that hire them to comply with all obligations under the law, including Social Security (CCSS), minimum wage, and maximum working hours.
The Minister of Labor, Olman Segura, said at a press conference that the objective is to put pressure on all agriculture, construction, and domestic employers to document and legalize their workers.
“We must comply with labor rights and we need to correct any irregular situations that exist,” Segura said.
The Minister said that these sectors are the particular focus of the Ministry of Labor because of the poor implementation of labor rights for these workers.
The three-month window for workers to become documented runs from June 17th until September. During this time, immigrants can make the necessary arrangements at their countries’ consulate in San Jose, instead of having to travel to their country of origin.
Deputy Minister of the Interior, Freddy Montero Mora, said that the plan “seeks to protect the fundamental rights of a large number of people who are already part of the daily process of many thriving productive sectors such as farms, construction, and hundreds of Costa Rican households who employ domestic workers.”
Montero said that immigrants will have to prove that they had a dependent employment relationship with their employer prior to December 31st, 2012, and will have to provide criminal records from their country.
The measure comes weeks after authorities discovered that at least 600 Nicaraguan agricultural workers were being exploited and living in subhuman conditions on orange farms in the northern part of the country.
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