The unemployed employer: the case of fraudulent employment agencies

Youth unemployment and joblessness remain a major socio-economic and political problem in Ghana and many other African countries. According to statista.com, the unemployment rate in Ghana currently stands at 6.71 per cent.

Though various governments over the period have tried their best, by way of policies, to help address the issue, it appears more needs to be done. Clearly, lack of jobs has serious implications for our national security and also on government revenue target because an increase in unemployment rate means a decrease in taxes for the state.

This is why the springing up of employment agencies to help the unemployed get job is very commendable. However, while many of these agencies are doing a good job to help address the unemployment situation in the country, there are also a good number of them out there that are perpetrating fraud on the unsuspecting youth who are in desperate need of jobs.

Akan proverb

The Akans have a proverb that says "se kwaterekwa se obema wo ntoma a tie no din", which literally means "if a naked man promises you a cloth, listen to his name". In other words, if the naked man had any clothes he will first wear them before giving away the extra.

Unfortunately, the growing levels of poverty and graduate unemployment situation in the country have resulted in some people, who themselves are unemployed, using their brains, albeit fraudulently, to create fake employment firms solely to extort money from innocent job seekers.

How they operate

A number of these fake agencies have taken hold of the online job portals, especially JobbermanGhana and JobwebGhana, to advertise all manner of nonexistent jobs.

Now, when a job seeker goes online in search of a job, the person will definitely come across a number of juicy vacancies, advertised by these fake agencies, and once the person applies, they will, in few days, send a text message, inviting all applicants to come for an interview at a certain date and location. Now, when they get there, GH¢30 will be demanded from each of them as processing fee for the interview. Assuming that 200 people were invited, GH¢30 multiplied by 200 will be equal to GH¢6,000.

After going through the interview, they will once again send the applicants a message, announcing to them that they have qualified for an aptitude test and here too an amount of GH¢50 will be taken from them. Let us also assume, at this stage, that 100 applicants qualified for the aptitude test. GH¢50 by 100 will sum up to GH¢5,000.

Again, after the aptitude test, they will text the applicants, this time, inviting them to come for a training of which it will cost each GH¢150. Once again, let us do the math; assuming 50 people qualified for the training stage, 50 by GH¢150 will amount to GH¢7,500.

This example is just for a single job vacancy, so if any of these agencies advertised say five vacancies, you can imagine how much money they will be extorting from these innocent job seekers.

Now after going through all the stages and making payments, they will then send the applicants text messages, informing them that they had failed and so they should try again next time. Since the messages are sent to the applicants individually, an applicant may think that it was he or she who didn't get the job and that it had been taken by one of the applicants, when none of them had actually secured the job.

Concept of recruitment agency

Recruitment agencies are outside firms who go and find the best-qualified candidates for an organisation in the most timely and cost-effective manner for employments (Artherbert.com).

According to Jim Stroud (2010), cited in Akua A. Berkoh (2013), the concept first popped up during the Second World War as a result of the void reated in industry by the military when it conscripted people from the other sectors of employment to join them.

This, somewhat, created a shortage of personnel to work in industry and so to increase labour force, industries at the time began to rely on agents to help them fill the vacancies in their companies.

What the law says in Ghana

But the phenomenon sprang up in Ghana in the 1990s under Section 7 of the Labour Act, as amended in 2003 (act 651). It is a corporate body, granted a licence by the Minister of Employment and Labour Relations to mainly assist the unemployed and employed get suitable jobs, and also help employers get suitable workers to take up jobs in their firms.

Clause One

Clause one of the act states that "a person shall not establish or operate a Private Employment Agency unless that person is a corporate body, has applied to, and has been granted a licence by the minister". The question here is; how many of these agencies have been granted a licence to operate?

Again, the act stipulates in Clause Six that "an Agency shall submit to the minister not later than 14 days after the end of every three months returns in respect of workers recruited for employment, whether in Ghana or outside Ghana, during that period". The question here also is; how many of them are or have complied with this provision?

It further states in Clause Seven that "an Agency shall refund 50 per cent of the fees paid by a client to the Agency, if the Agency is unable to secure a job placement for the client after the expiration of three months".

Again, how many of these agencies have or are complying with this law.

The writer is a trained journalist. You can contact him via Salifubbmoro@gmail.com