Vietnamese businesswomen who violate the requirement to employ EU nationals in order not to lose their residency permit have to leave this week after a court rejected their plea to suspend their deportation pending their appeal with the Migration Department.
The cousins Ngoc Anh Thu Vu and Thi Phuong Dung Le, who have been running a small café in Šiauliai called Saigon Kava for almost six years, were informed two weeks ago that their residence permits had been revoked.
The letter sent by the Migration Department stated that the foreigners had violated the existing rules that require them to employ at least two EU nationals in order to qualify for continued residence.
The Vietnamese women were surprised because they had previously complied with this requirement – they had a beauty salon in Vilnius employing three Lithuanians citizens. The situation changed last spring when the women closed this loss-making part of their business.
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The Vietnamese women said they were planning to open a shop this year, but now they were asked to leave within 14 days.
The women, who sold everything back home before coming to Lithuania, tried to appeal the Migration Department’s decision. However, their request for a temporary suspension of the decision, so that they do not have to leave until their appeal is processes, has been rejected by courts.
The situation of foreigners doing business in Lithuania was also discussed by the parliamentary Human Rights Committee on Wednesday.
Evelina Gudzinskaitė, head of the Migration Department, admitted that not all foreigners receive warnings that they might be violating rules and face having their residence permits revoked. According to her, amid staffing shortages in the Migration Department, priority is given to large companies.
Gudzinskaitė also said that the case of Ngoc Anh Thu Vu and Thi Phuong Dung Le in Šiauliai was pretty straightforward – the women had once before breached the rule of employing locals, they then fixed, got their residence permits extended, and dismissed local workers again.
Danutė Petrauskienė of the Ministry of the Interior said that the procedure had been tightened because of massive abuse, with third-country nationals often setting up businesses simply for the opportunity to move freely within the EU.
At the moment, 294 foreigners have permits to officially do business in Lithuania. Before the rules were tightened a decade ago, there were over 4,000 such businesses.
Romas Stumbrys, head of the Association of Business Immigrants and Investors, criticised the restrictions because they drive away potential taxpaying businesses.
He conceded, however, that there had been abuses before.
“I welcome this story being discussed. The procedure is flawed because foreign women who have been working for almost six years can no longer develop their business. Let’s consider whether it is right to require the owner of an IT company, for example, to employ a local if they can do everything themselves?”
Laferta, the company that owns Saigon Kava in Šiauliai, has debts. According to Rekvizitai.lt, it owes almost 18,000 euros to the State Tax Inspectorate and some 200 euros to the Social Insurance Fund (Sodra), in addition to 2,500 euros in deferred payments.
The deadline for the Vietnamese women to leave the country expires on 5 December, after which they can be deported.
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