Aid pours in but workers still suffer
Aid pours in but workers still suffer
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Relief worth billions of rupiah continues to pour in for some
18,000 returning workers in overcrowded camps in Nunukan, East
Kalimantan, but their condition is rapidly deteriorating mainly
due to a severe lack of nutritious food and clean sanitation
facilities.
A number of camps are still crammed with hundreds, or even
thousands, of fatigued workers, while the construction of new
barracks has brought only little relief to their suffering.
"It is not true that we are eating three times a day. You can
see for yourself what we are eating," Selle, 45, told Antara in
despair on Sunday.
Selle, hailing from Sidrap, South Sulawesi, said he had been
staying at the Pasar Ikan barracks for more than a month.
Social affairs minister Bachtiar Chamsjah said during a visit
by Vice President Hamzah Haz to Nunukan last week that the
workers were eating nutritious food three times a day.
Most workers in refugee camps such as Porsas, Pasar Ikan, PT
Inhutani Sawmil and others camps, however, said that they ate
only twice a day -- at 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. -- with a regular menu
of rice and small dried fish known as dilis.
In the meantime, financial assistance from various groups has
reached over Rp 8 billion since Hamzah's visit, but the funds
have barely alleviated the workers' suffering.
A lot of funds are channeled through various volunteer groups,
including those spontaneously set up by local people, making it
difficult for the government to control.
The workers' ordeal is further exacerbated by a critical
shortage of clean water.
"We have to buy water for bathing and other needs, and every
time we go to the toilet we have to pay Rp 1,000. Nothing is free
here," said another worker called Melle.
Mrs. Nina, who has been in a Nunukan camp for almost one
month, spoke of a similar experience.
Antara reported on Sunday that only refugee camps in Mambunuit
village, South Nunukan, which were built after Hamzah's visit
last week, have clean water and serve nutritious food.
Unfortunately, however, only around 200 workers out of the
originally planned 1,200 enjoy the facility.
The workers are also complaining about difficulties
encountered in acquiring passports.
"We have come to learn that it is extremely difficult to
acquire a passport. Almost one and a half months have passed and
I still don't have one," said Nasir, a worker from Bantaeng
regency, South Sulawesi.
Tens of thousands of Indonesians fled to Nunukan in August
after Malaysia imposed a new immigration law that introduced
caning, a fine and imprisonment for foreigners working illegally
there.