National News - Monday, July 23, 2007
Ridwan Max Sijabat, Jakarta
Labor exporters and activists have called on President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to evaluate the implementation of a 2006 presidential instruction on rapid, cheap and safe labor exports following a rift between Manpower and Transmigration Minister Erman Suparno and chairman of the government-sponsored National Labor Placement and Protection Agency Jumhur Hidayat.
Migrant Care, a nongovernmental organization that provides advocacy for migrant workers overseas, said the mounting friction between the two officials had left migrant workers unprotected.
"We consider the rift to be one of authority and mainly due to conflicting interests. As evidence, both sides have never been involved in any fight for workers' interests," Migrant Care's policy coordinator Wahyu Susilo told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.
The rift started when the labor agency froze licenses recently awarded by Erman to an insurance consortium led by state-owned PT Jasindo and set up a private committee to implement the G-to-G agreement on the export of workers to South Korea.
Husein Alaydrus, chairman of the Indonesian Association of Labor Supplying Companies, called on the government to replace the insurance consortium with a trust fund whose duties would then carried out by an independent agency to ensure migrant workers' safety and welfare both at home and abroad.
The rift has also caused wide confusion and disagreement among labor exporters, who have called on the President to liquidate either the labor agency or the ministry for allegedly being corrupt and imposing red tape on migrant workers.
Migrant Care executive director Anis Hidayah expressed deep concern over the rift, saying both institutions had paid little attention to the thousands of troubled migrant workers, many facing death row, in Malaysia and Saudi Arabia.
"Conflicting interests have a lot to do with their efforts to raise funds for the 2009 general elections," she said.
The director of the Binawan Healthcare Institute, which supplies nurses and health workers overseas, Saleh Alwaini, called on the President to mediate the rift and give special attention to labor exports, as it was the only subsector able to help cope with unemployment problems and eradicate poverty.
"The government has to set up more labor training centers to improve the quality of job seekers and reform the corrupt bureaucracy to accelerate labor exports," he said.
