ASEAN looks at protecting women workers abroad

ASEAN looks at protecting women workers abroad

By Sumono Mustoffa

JAKARTA: Should the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) break away from its usual "black-tie" diplomatic concerns to tackle, as a group, the nitty-gritty issue of protecting thousands of its women who work as domestic helpers abroad?

The 10-nation grouping recently concluded its summit in Manila, where it heard a number of Utopian schemes. Philippine President Joseph Estrada, for example, called for a common currency.

Finance leaders discussed the pace of ASEAN's rebound from the regional economic crisis, and foreign ministers assessed the potential for conflict in the Spratly Islands.

That is fine. The collapse of the Soeharto regime in Indonesia and the controversial jailing of Anwar Ibrahim in Malaysia signaled a refreshing apertura -- or opening -- to the libertarian winds sweeping the world.

But as the new century opens, voices in Jakarta, where ASEAN maintains its secretariat on bustling Jl. Sisingamangaraja, ask: Will this body take aggressive and coordinated action to protect the rights of its mistreated and abused women who seek jobs abroad?

That question resonates in the Philippines and Thailand. Both have thousands of its citizens working in other ASEAN countries, like Malaysia and Singapore, as well as in Hong Kong, Taipei and oil-rich Middle Eastern countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The Philippines today is Asia's largest exporter of labor -- ahead of Indonesia, China and Vietnam.

A minority of these workers are specialists like doctors, pilots, nurses, architects, etc. They form the well-known "brain drain".

But a majority are the less-educated young, pushed out by joblessness. Unemployment and underemployment in Indonesia are in the double digits. Relatively higher wages in foreign countries is a pull factor in the "brawn drain".

In the late 1990s, labor migration flows changed, according to the Asian Development Bank. High-income countries like Brunei, Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong have emerged as "new destinations for migrant labor".

The stories of abuse faced by these migrant workers are long, consistent and well-documented. Crimes against women from ASEAN countries, as well as Bangladesh and India, include unpaid salaries, inhumane working conditions, confiscation of passports, physical abuse, etc.

Jakarta recently witnessed the return of an Indonesian woman who escaped beheading after knifing her Saudi employer who tried to rape her.

Flor Contemplation of the Philippines was executed in Singapore after a trial that left far too many questions unanswered. Thai women have had their passports confiscated and salaries withheld.

In countries like Saudi Arabia, the right of workers from ASEAN and other countries to worship freely is curtailed.

So far, most ASEAN countries, including Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines, have worked, on a bilateral basis, on protecting their nationals. But this is an issue of common concern.

Why should the ASEAN grouping not be used to protect these citizens? That would bring ASEAN's perspective beyond narrow national borders to a broader vision of a common regional identity.

Common action in ensuring the implementation of United Nations' conventions on labor and migrant workers on an ASEAN- wide basis offers a useful avenue for work in the new millennium.

It would also go a long way toward erasing ASEAN's image as the "last refuge of unconstituted violators of human rights".

-- (DEPTHnews)