Illegals

According to official statistics, nearly one million Ukrainian citizens are working abroad. Unofficial sources indicate that the number of Ukrainian wage-earners in foreign countries tops seven million. Law enforcement agencies say that one in every hundred illegal immigrants is reported missing.

A TYPICAL CASE

Without the pay that was promised to them, the Ukrainian workers were forced to dig through garbage cans for food.

The story recounted by Oleksii Pavliuchenko, a native of Cherkasy, is typical for Ukrainian illegal immigrants. The search for a better life often leads them nearly into slavery.

After struggling with his family for a long time to make ends meet in a small room of a residential hotel, Oleksii realized that in pursuing the builder’s trade in Cherkasy he would never earn enough to purchase even the cheapest housing. Then a friend of his advised him to contact a Kyiv-based firm that guaranteed employment in “lands flowing with milk and honey.” Unlike many other similar businesses, this firm charged a moderate fee.

“You only need to pay $200 for document processing and $200 for the trip. You will go as tourists to the Czech Republic, where your employers will pick you up and provide you with a well-paid job and three meals a day,” a pretty representative of the foreign employment agency explained to Oleksii and his friend Serhii.

Taken in by such an attractive and relatively cheap offer, the young men borrowed money from various relatives and friends and left for the country where they hoped all their problems would be resolved.

There was somebody waiting for them. A middle-aged man, who introduced himself as Arsen, and a manager of a construction company, took them and a few other Ukrainians to a run-down cottage. The building had more than 10 rooms, each one containing up to 20 bunk beds. “This is where you will live. You will be working at a subway construction site. You’ll be able to earn a lot of money, if you want to, because we don’t limit the workday,” Arsen recounted.

Somewhat disappointed by their unsatisfactory living conditions, the young men tried to remain optimism. The next surprise came when they found out that nobody was going to provide meals. “This is not in our agreement with your firm,” said the manager, who was surprised by their question.

The dreary, monotonous days that followed were filled with hard work in a dimly lit space underground, which lasted from 7 a.m. until 8 p.m. They did not have any money, so they had to eat what they could find in garbage cans, and this became their source of daily sustenance.

After a month they found Arsen and asked for their wages. “Wait a bit. You will get your money in a week,” he reassured them.

But one week passed, then another. It seemed that no one was going to pay them anything. Finally, after working three months without pay, Arsen said: “If you don’t like it, leave.”

“Where could we go? We were illegal immigrants,” said Oleksii, continuing his story. “If we had gone to the city, we would have been arrested by the police right away. And then how could we prove anything: who we are and what we were doing there, without our passports, which our employers had taken away from us?”

For more than six months our young men worked as modern-day slaves. They were not alone in their misery — by their reckoning, up to a hundred Ukrainians from one residential unit were laboring at the underground construction site.

One day a fight broke out between Stanislav from Luhansk oblast and Arsen over the unpaid wages. A few days date the Ukrainian worker was found dead at the construction site next to the subway tracks. They quickly buried him in that spot. “He is not the first,” says Dmytro with a sigh. Dmytro is an elderly Ukrainian man from Kyiv oblast, who had worked there for over two years. He added: “The graves of our Ukrainian men fill a whole cemetery here.”

After this incident Oleksii and Serhii decided to escape. By hook or by crook they found their way to the Ukrainian Embassy and eventually returned to Ukraine. They came back to Cherkasy penniless but happy that they had survived.

THE MECHANISM OF FRAUD

Oleksandr Yarovenko, head of the Department for Combating International Organized Crime Groups in the Kyiv Department for Combating Organized Crime (UBOZ), says there are very many businesses in Western European countries, whose workforce is made up of illegal immigrants from Ukraine.

According to Yarovenko, the mechanism of fraud operates this way. A girl comes to a firm claiming to guarantee employment abroad and says that she would like to find a job as a seamstress. The firm’s representatives tell her that the fee for obtaining a visa and processing documents is $3,000. When she says she does not have this kind of money, they offer her the option by promising to take her to some foreign country and finding her a job on credit. She will be earning $2,000 per month, she is told, and will soon repay her debt.

So the Ukrainian girl starts working at a clothing factory. However, her actual wage turns out to be drastically lower than what she was promised. Her employers tell her that illegal Ukrainian immigrants here receive $150 per month minus $50 for room and board. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to calculate how long Ukrainians have to work to pay off their debts. And when you are left virtually without any rights in a foreign country, it is useless to make complaints or demands.

There are also cases of people selling themselves into slavery in Ukraine. According to reports from Kyiv and other cities, salespeople at flea markets in Kyiv are often forced to go months without being paid because the owner suspects them of damaging or stealing merchandize (whereas the owner himself often fakes a robbery to avoid paying his sellers). Cases of fraud abound in commercial businesses, primarily in stores and other sales organizations.

After his employees work for several months the employer refuses to pay them or says that they owe him a large sum of money. In cases where the victim puts up a fight, he or she is threatened with bodily harm.

What is the source of this plight — is it the Ukrainian mentality or ignorance of the law?

Ukrainians traditionally blame their misfortunes on anyone and anything: the state, fraudulent firms, all sorts of foreign swindlers, and even their own mentality, which is the supposed cause of their gullibility — but not on their ignorance of the law.

ADVICE FROM EXPERTS

The Day asked the Kyiv UBOZ to provide a few tips to people who have decided to work abroad.

First of all, when you contact an employment firm, do not hesitate to ask them to show you the firm’s license for this type of business activity. The license must contain a list of services that the firm is allowed to offer. When foreign employment is not listed as a separate item, it is better to have nothing to do with such an agency. In any case, job seekers should never fall for various first-we’ll-get-you-a-tourist-visa-and-then-find-an-employer offers.

Second, ask the employment agency to show you its contract with foreign businesses, which should contain a description of the employment terms for workers from Ukraine. You should pay attention to the date the contract was signed, its duration, the types of workers and specialists sought, and — this is a must — the pay scale.

Third, the firm has to sign a contract with the client, which clearly lists the services, their duration, and the pay scale. You should read this document very carefully or you may find out in court later that you have paid several thousand dollars for information or an introduction to the historical sites in a country rather than for a guaranteed job. Each document must contain a wet stamp or seal and the original signature of the executive officer or chief accountant. This advice is also applicable to employment in Ukrainian commercial businesses. When signing a work contract, you should insist that including the pay scale and terms of payment are listed. You should not be fooled by promises of the following kind: in the contract we will include the official sum of 400 hryvnias but we will actually pay you 1,500. In the best-case scenario, if they do not defraud you after one month and actually pay you the full unofficial sum, you will regret this kind of employment later when it comes to paying for sick leave, maternity leave, and pensions.

Awareness of these basic legal norms will reduce your chances of being duped by even the most experienced tricksters. The best thing to do, though, is to consult a lawyer before signing any dubious work contract.