hankyoreh

The Burmese man eating at a restaurant in Pocheon, Gyeonggi Province, looked just like a Korean. He ate Korean food, including kimchi, and used chopsticks in the Korean style, speaking nearly effortlessly in his adopted country's language.

He has been living as an illegal migrant worker since he came to the nation in 1994 at age 23 on a tourist visa. Working hard, he is now recognized as a skilled furniture cutter. However, he has remained uneasy all the time due to his tenuous legal status. He has been at the same furniture factory in Pocheon for the past four years, and is now a manager due to his excellent technique and Korean language skills. Twelve out of 26 workers at the factory are illegal foreigners from Asian countries such as Myanmar and India.

"I recently hid myself in the mountains near the company during [an immigration crackdown]. Such a situation happens two times every month. If we are deported, the factory will be in trouble, as well. Why can't they let us work as we have done? Korea is like a second home to me," he said.

A 27-year-old illegal migrant worker from Kyrgyzstan works at a small textile trading company in Bucheon, Gyeonggi Province. After working at a number of companies as a short-term worker, he managed to find a regular full-time job in October last year. He is the only foreigner out of 11 employees at the textile exporter, but has a major role, as he is in charge of marketing for Central Asia.

He learned the Korean language after struggling a great deal, so as not to be at a disadvantage. He got married three years ago and has a three-year-old son. The head of the company loves the worker as if he were part of his own family - and in a way he is: the company head adopted the worker's son on paper so that the boy can attend school and will grow up without worrying about his legal status in Korea. About the worker, the company head said, "He is an essential member of our company. I feel anxious due to his status as an illegal foreigner."

These illegal migrant workers do not have legal qualification granted by the government to reside in the nation, but they are members of Korean society and industry, just the same. According to data from the Ministry of Justice, as of the end of last year, illegal foreign workers number over 187,000 out of about 420,000 migrant workers. There is almost no factory employing solely Korean-born workers at the multitude of industrial complexes in Ansan, Gyeonggi Province.

Yu Seong-hwan, an official at the Ansan Migrants' Center, stressed, "Illegal migrant workers who have settled in the nation speak Korean fluently, and are very skillful. To small companies, they are precious employees, as these firms suffer from a shortage of manpower," adding that if the nation deports them and instead brings in workers who cannot speak Korean, the economy will receive a serious loss.

According to a survey performed by the government in 2002, about 120,000, or 48.1 percent, out of 250,000 illegal foreigners were working at companies with less than 30 employees. These figures bear out the fact that foreign workers play important roles in small companies, where Korean workers often hesitate to work due to comparably low wages and limited opportunity.

The manpower shortage in small and medium-sized firms amounted to 99,000 workers, or 4.35 percent of the total required workers. Such a shortage is growing more serious due to Korea's low birthrate and aging society. A report released by the Korea Labor Institute last year said, "A manpower shortage is expected to happen in domestic industries between 2010 and 2015. The number of foreign workers will likely surpass 1 million by 2020."

Woo Sam-yeol, a secretary-general of the Joint Committee with Migrants in Korea (JCMK), stressed, "Migrant workers who have settled in the nation are well-prepared laborers because they have been adapting to Korean society in terms of the language, culture and work technique. We should consider ways to harmoniously settle them in our society, instead of deporting them without reserve."

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