A group of eight girls had gathered inside the International Labour Orgnisation office at Bauddaloka Mawatha in Colombo 7 earlier this week.
They had arrived from impoverished homes from different parts of the country and were eagerly waiting to meet the chief ILO representative in Sri Lanka Ms. Simrin Singh.
Although simple in appearance they had been however trained to handle a tough, arduous and dangerous employment task in exchange for a reasonable monthly wage.
They were the latest group of female gantry crane operators sponsored by the National Union of Seafarers Sri Lanka (USS) and supported by the International Labour with (ILO) and funded by the Japanese Government. Earlier the NUSS along with the ILO were able to train maritime related personnel both male and female who have now been absorbed into permanent employment in various categories such as Seafarers, plumbers, electricians and so on, NUSS President Palitha Atukorale said. “The main task ahead for us right now is to select and train more persons from impoverished families into the maritime sector and towards this end we will be working with the ILO, the Voice of the Migrant Collective Front and other stakeholders’, Atukorale said.
Another target we are seriously looking at is to send these recruits for overseas placements while the time working with the ‘Migrant Workers’ they are widespread throughout the country with some 26 officers in eight districts, Atukorale said.