New insurance scheme for workers unveiled
JAKARTA (JP): The government has introduced a new insurance scheme for Indonesians working overseas, in a bid to raise sufficient funds to protect them better in the future.
Speaking at a year-end media conference here yesterday, Minister of Manpower Abdul Latief admitted failures in his office's handling of many labor problems in the past. He blamed it on an absence of funds.
He said the insurance fund would be managed by a consortium of insurance companies and supervised by the government.
"The scheme is being established because, in our experience, there have been many problems that we have failed to handle thoroughly because there has not been adequate funds available," he said.
Thousands of Indonesians in abroad are vulnerable to mistreatment. Many are arbitrarily laid off, sometimes without pay, before their contracts expire, without having any recourse to legal assistance.
Latief said efforts to protect the country's workers abroad were "absolutely needed", and that the new scheme would serve the purpose.
"A social insurance program like the one offered by PT Jamsostek cannot meet the real needs (of the workers) because its compensation is too small," he said, referring the state-owned workers' welfare insurance company.
Jamsostek gives compensation of Rp 2.2 million (US$440) to the beneficiaries of a worker who dies. It also provides 60 times a worker's basic monthly salary if he or she sustains injuries in work-related accidents.
Latief said the new scheme would offer at least six guarantees to its policyholders, including US$1,800 in compensation for death, plus additional expenses for repatriating the body. There will also be compensation of $900 for workers who lose their jobs before completing their contracts.
"Employers will be required to pay their employees' insurance premium fees," Latief said.
He said these ranged from US$40 per year, or $3.33 per month for those sent to Saudi Arabia, $22.50 or $1.87 per month for those sent to the other Middle East countries, to Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Brunei.
The insurance premium fee for those sent to Taiwan is $32, or $2.66 per month.
"It's a two-year insurance scheme," Latief said.
Latief said a trial run was begun last April and would be evaluated in two years time.
There are 144,000 participants so far, but by October next year the scheme will be made an obligation for the employers of all workers sent abroad, Latief said.
It was revealed yesterday that the new insurance scheme has so far generated $10 million. Latief said the claims of 1,682 workers, who had been laid off before their work contracts were completed, had been paid. The beneficiaries of 68 workers who died had also received compensation.
"We cannot let workers be sent abroad unprotected," said the minister who was accompanied yesterday by, among others, his secretary-general, Suwarto, and the chairman of the Association of Indonesian Labor Exporters (Apjati), Abdullah Puteh.
"We want our workers to be more aware of the need of having insurance," he said.
Apjati data shows that 951,585 Indonesian workers have been legally sent to countries in the Asia-Pacific region, the United States, Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
Labor rights activists have often criticized the government for exporting unskilled workers who were prone to abuse by their employers. Latief himself had once admitted that he shed tears over the plight of many migrant workers.
The criticism over the migrant workers came to a head earlier this year when the Saudi Arabian government beheaded Soleha Anam Kadiran who was found guilty of killing her employer for repeatedly sexually abusing her. (aan)