House blasts labor export management
House blasts labor export management
JAKARTA (JP): The House of Representatives blamed yesterday
the high number of Indonesian illegal workers in Saudi Arabia on
the government's poor management of labor export.
Legislator Samsoedin, who led a team to Saudi Arabia last
month, told a House plenary session that poor teamwork among
related government offices had caused excessive problems ranging
from recruitment to the placement of workers in the kingdom.
"We found that the lack of coordination among the Ministry of
Manpower, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Defense,
Ministry of Religious Affairs, Ministry of Justice and the office
of the State Minister of Women's Roles led to visa abuses,
illegal brokerage and counterfeit of immigration documents at the
expense of the workers," Samsoedin said.
Samsoedin said during the five-day trip to Saudi Arabia, the
team also discovered that Indonesian workers usually lost
contacts with their exporting companies and the Indonesian
Embassy there.
"There is no accurate data on how many and where the workers
are. Consequently, it's difficult for the Indonesian Embassy to
provide legal aid to legal workers, not to mention illegal ones,"
Samsoedin said.
An estimated 600,000 Indonesians are legally working in Saudi
Arabia. Eighty-five percent of them are women, mostly working as
housemaids. Most of the Indonesian workers abroad are in
Malaysia, totaling some 1.5 million.
The House team of eight stayed in the Arabian oil-rich country
from Nov. 11 to Nov. 16 in the aftermath of the Saudian
government's crackdown on illegal workers that forced the
Indonesian government to repatriate 24,000 people.
Criticism over the government's failure to protect Indonesian
workers in Saudi Arabia escalated when an illegal female worker
Nasiroh faced execution shortly after her compatriot Soleha Anam
Kadiran was beheaded after being found guilty of murder.
Nasiroh escaped the death penalty only after the government
intervened.
The House suggested yesterday that the government tighten its
control over worker exporting companies, enhance the skills of
workers to be sent abroad and appeal to Saudia Arabia to sign a
memorandum of understanding on the export of workers.
Another House recommendation was to curb the export of
unskilled workers. "The sending of housemaids must be gradually
phased out and stopped," Samsoedin said. (amd)