There is a need to establish the legal status of the Fijian migrants in this section. Kassim (in Toh Thian Ser 1998: 68),^[3] while discussing contemporary migration within and from South-East Asia, has classified immigrant workers into two categories: they are either legal or illegal. But the line demarcating the two can be very blurred and the two categories can become interchangeable. At the same time, an alien might enter a country legally but work there illegally, without a work permit.

While Kassim also elaborated on what illegal workers were, this paper will focus mainly on his definition of a legal alien as it closely identifies with the labour migrant situation being discussed here. Therefore, according to Kassim, ^[4] alien workers are regarded as legal when they conform to the immigration and labour laws of the host country. Further, they can be recruited in two ways: 1) they might have been recruited directly from the sending countries, brought in through authorised ports of entry and given temporary work permits; or 2) they might have arrived illegally and worked without employment permits but were later regularised through an amnesty exercise.

In the context of this research, most of the Fijian labour migrants (89 per cent) were recruited in Fiji by recruiting agents or government officials for various government ministries of the host countries (50 per cent), private schools and tertiary institutions (21 per cent), businesses (12 per cent), and churches (6 per cent), and were taken into the host countries through authorised ports of entry. They were also granted temporary work permits or contracts of various lengths, from a minimum of two years up to indefinite periods. On the basis of Kassim’s work, the labour migrants from Fiji represented in this study are legal alien workers. The remaining workers (11 per cent) had accompanied their spouses and were later recruited to work. They too were offered temporary work permits and contracts to allow them to work in Kiribati and the Marshall Islands.

Approximately 98 per cent of the skilled migrants were issued with work permits and these were granted either while still in Fiji (therefore, they signed on as expatriates with a different set of work conditions and salary scales) or on entry into their destination country. The latter were hired on a local contract basis, for example, some as teachers and government officials in Kiribati and some as nurses and teachers in the Marshalls:

The length and validity of employment contracts varied from one year (8 per cent of the respondents), to two years (68 per cent), three years (6 per cent) or for even longer periods (18 per cent). Most of the nurses and teachers worked for two- or three-year terms before renewal (43 per cent) or are intending to return to Fiji (57 per cent) at the end of their current contract. The high percentages for renewals and the intention to return support the argument that Fijian labour migration to other parts of the Pacific is temporary and might be circular migration. This can be determined only by further studies.

Finally, 96 per cent of the respondents indicated that they did not pay a bond deposit to immigration officials at their entry point to destination countries. There has been a prevailing general attitude of acceptance of Fijian nationals entering other Pacific Islands on the strength of their Fijian passports alone. Therefore, Fijian nationals may enter certain Pacific Island countries without a formal visa if the length of their stay is less than a month. With current and future socioeconomic and political developments taking place in Fiji and within the region, this state of affairs might change. Indeed, the absence of a bond deposit and a month’s visa-free visit for Fijian citizens encourages temporary migration to some Pacific Island countries and creates employment opportunities for those who are so inclined.