Migrant Workers Are Facing Double Jeopardy Abroad

The jakarta Globe, December 30, 2013.


Surabaya. The problems faced by Indonesian migrant workers are not only that their salaries are being held back by their employers or that they have been forced into slavery.

Up to 265 are also facing the death penalty in several countries, including Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and China, says one migrant worker activist.

“It’s not just salary and slavery practice issues,” founder and executive director of Migrant Care, Anis Hidayah, said in Surabaya, East Java, on Friday.

“Our migrant workers are also facing the death penalty.”

Anis told hundreds of National Democratic Party (NasDem) female legislative candidates in Surabaya that 213 Indonesian migrants in Malaysia were currently being processed by the legal system there.

“Seventy out of 213 cases have already been handed the death sentence,” she said.

“In Saudi Arabia nine cases involving migrant workers from Indonesia have resulted in the death sentence and 33 cases were still being processed.”

Anis said another nine Indonesian nationals were facing the death penalty in China and 18 were still being processed, adding that she found the numbers “sad.”

There have already been instances where foreign governments have followed through on death sentences for Indonesian migrant workers with executions, such as Basri Masse (1990) and Karno Marzuki (1991) in Malaysia; Yanti Iriyanti (2008) and Ruyati (2011) in Saudi Arabia, and Darman Agustiri (2010) in Egypt.

Wifrida Soik, a migrant worker from Atambua, East Nusa Tenggara, is on trial in Malaysia’s northern state of Kelantan for allegedly killing her employer. She too faces the death penalty.

However, Wilfrida is believed to have been a minor at the time of the murder. Wilfrida’s defenders also cite that she was lured abroad by labor traffickers with false promises.

Wilfrida’s murder trial has fueled a public controversy over the working conditions of Indonesian migrant labor in Malaysia.

Wilfrida has said she was trying to defend herself at the time of the incident.

“What happened to the Indonesian migrant workers can be contributed to mistakes related to illegal documents,” Anis said.

“101,067 illegal migrant workers applied to be legalized but only 17,306 obtained their working papers, and 6,700 people received exit permits,” she said.

Anis said there was still only a partial or an ad-hoc understanding of the protection of migrant workers, which in turn led to reactive and delayed treatment of migrant worker issues.

She pointed to the “Rp 1,000 to Bring Workers Home” drive to buy return tickets for laborers stranded in Saudi Arabia by the Indonesian government.

“To minimize or even stop such incidents, the regional governments that send migrant workers overseas should take more proactive roles [in safeguarding their welfare],” she reminded.

Anis said regional governments should provide sufficient information, services, affordable and good facilities. Regional governments must also set up integrated services to ease the burdens of migrant workers, she added.

“Provide facilities and infrastructure for migrant workers so that they have the qualification,” Anis said.

The representatives of the central and regional governments overseas must also make efforts to get job orders from employers overseas and the government and legislators have to finalize the migrant workers law revision,” she said.



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