Nepalis in Cyprus wait out cancelled flights

Numerically, Australia is the top overseas destination for Nepali students. Japan comes second. Which is the third?

Many will be surprised to know that it is Cyprus. In 2017-18, over 2,300 Nepalis left for Cyprus on students visas. Government records show that in the past two years, 3,304 Nepalis obtained labour approvals to work in Cyprus. There are now some 12,000 Nepalis in Cyprus, and most of them are women caregivers.

After the onset of the pandemic, more than 400 Nepalis in Cyprus signed up to return to Nepal, but the Nepal Airlines flights scheduled to bring them home have been repeatedly cancelled. The flight on 20 June has now been postponed till 3 July.

The flights were cancelled because Nepal Airlines is still in the EU blacklist for aviation safety concerns. Says a NRN-Cyprus representative: “This was such a simple oversight, since everyone knew about the EU ban on Nepali carriers.”

The repeated flight postponements caused confusion and frustration among Nepalis, especially the first lot of 85 who had rushed to buy Nepal Airlines tickets. They are now pinning their hopes on the 3 July flight on Qatar Airways.

The Kathmandu airlift begins, Upasana Khadka

The Kathmandu Airlift, Editorial

Rita is in her final year of her Master’s course in hotel management, and has decided to stay put and complete her degree. “For those of us who have been here longer, it is not as problematic and we can get by,” she told us on the phone from Nicosia. “It is the ones who came recently that are more vulnerable.”

The Cyprus government barred students who arrived in Cyprus after 10 May 2019 from working 20 hours per week, and a number of them need to return at the earliest because they have been surviving on the charity of fellow-Nepalis. Most Nepali students pay for their education from money they earn from part-time work.

A few students who spent nights in parks in Nicosia after not being able to pay rent were supported by the Nepali community. While there are landlords who have cut residents some slack by waiving or discounting the rent, not everyone is as generous.

Ramesh came to Cyprus in late 2019 for his MBA, and is affected by the recent change in policies regarding part-time work. He says it is Nepalis who are cheating fellow-Nepalis by being the agents of universities.

“It is after I came here that I realised that the Nepalis who were going out of their way to facilitate our paperwork were getting kickbacks from the university for placements, and many of their assurances were blatant lies,” Ramesh said.

Even during normal times, finding legal part-time work was difficult for students. As a result students rely on South Asian agents including Nepalis who charge a hefty commission for job placement support. Others find irregular work in farms, restaurants or as janitors. But even those jobs are now hard to come by because of the economic slump caused by the pandemic.

One-way ticket home for overseas Nepali workers, Upasana Khadka

“I have discontinued my MBA course, and have no option but to return to Nepal,” says Ramesh, who has so far spent Rs1.1 million for education and related fees to go to Cyprus. His father wired him some money to survive for the past few months.

Cyprus does not come in the mainstream discourse a lot, perhaps due to the relatively small number of Nepalis there. NRN Cyprus sources say there are merits to working in Cyprus because the wages are good, there is little domestic violence or abuse of caregivers, and food and accommodation costs are relatively low. Even so, a bilateral labour agreement between Cyprus and Nepal is long overdue to protect workers’ rights.

Nepali caregivers earn much less than Indians and Filipinas, but Nepalis also have to pay up to Rs500,000 in recruitment fees to recruiters. One Nepali caregiver says she earns €309 a month, and the pandemic has increased the workload in the household that employs her, and she does not get weekends or, or overtime pay. She paid Rs380,000 to a recruitment agency to get her this job.

Messages from education consultancies trying to entice Nepalis to study in Cyprus. More than 2,300 Nepali students left for Cyprus just last year.

Despite this, caregivers are better off than the students. Many of them blame Nepal’s failed education system and the lack of regulation of profit-driven education consultancies.

“The least the Nepal government can do is approve or recognise the universities where Nepali students can be sent by the agents so we do not end up in fake, blacklisted or sub-standard institutions,” says one Nepali student who is on the 3 July flight.

He adds: “The Nepal government does not recognise the degree of some Cyprus universities when the students get back home, but it has no problem providing outgoing students with No Objection Certificates to attend those very institutions. It just does not make sense.”

Read also:

The high cost of returning to Nepal, Nepali Times

Nepal struggles to make repatriation easier, Nepali Times