Nunukan gets belated, high-powered visit

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

In a delayed response to an impending crisis, Vice President Hamzah Haz and an entourage of four ministers are to visit the thousands of migrant workers languishing in camps in the border town of Nunukan, East Kalimantan, on Wednesday; the first high level visit since the exodus that has claimed 32 lives began late July.

The visit comes amid criticism the government is doing too little too late to help the stranded workers, many of whom suffering from various health problems.

Chairman of the country's largest Muslim organization, Nahdlatul Ulama's (NU) Hasyim Muzadi and other prominent figures plan their own visits next week while the Navy sent its warship KRI Tanjung Kambani on Tuesday to serve as a floating hospital.

Navy Chief of Staff Adm. Bernard Kent Sondakh said its floating hospital Tanjung Kambani would arrive in Nunukan within two days. The ship comes equipped with 1,500 beds and medical staff from the Army and the Ministry of Health, he added.

Accompanying Hamzah will be Minister of Home Affairs Hari Sabarno, Minister of Health Achmad Sujudi, Minister of Manpower and Transmigration Jacob Nuwa Wea and State Minister for Social Affairs Bachtiar Chamsyah. Four legislators plan to join as well.

Hamzah will stay in Nunukan for two hours where he is to meet the workers and "have a dialog with them".

NU chairman Hasyim said he and members of the country's second largest Muslim organization Muhammadiyah, and the Indonesian Communion of Churches and others plan to visit Nunukan on Sept. 11.

"We want to analyze the problems based on the situation on the ground," Hasyim was quoted by Antara without elaborating.

Nunukan drew nationwide attention after it became home to some 40,000 workers who fled Malaysia to avoid its crackdown on illegal workers with the passing of a July 31 deadline.

Workers are living in cramped makeshift camps where the lack of clean water, food and proper sanitation have led to the deaths of 32 workers since the end of July and 67 since May.

Indonesian Red Cross (PMI) chairman Mar'ie Muhammad, visiting the island on Tuesday, categorized the situation in Nunukan as an "emergency".

"In accordance to the standards of the international Red Cross as well as the Ministry of Health, this is an extraordinary situation. This is an emergency," Mar'ie told reporters as she toured a vacant health service unit built by a labor-hire company.

Immigration officials in Nunukan said they were expecting 60,000 to 80,000 more workers this month.

At least 20 recruitment agencies and an immigration official are stationed on the island to speed up the process.

The local immigration office has added more staff and computers to issue as many as 5,000 passports a day from 700 on normal days.

As more workers come in, aid relief organizations have warned of further deaths due to the poor conditions in the camps.

Aid is on its way to Nunukan, but legislator Posma Tobing, who chairs the House of Representatives Commission VII handling labor affairs, said the aid should had been sent in early August.

Posmo urged the government to relocate some of the workers to nearby regions to ease the load on Nunukan.

The island is both the exit and entry point for workers coming from Malaysia's side of Borneo in Sabah and those wishing to return once they obtain work permits.

Nunukan facilitates the departure of workers from the eastern part of Indonesia. Other arrival points in Sumatra and Kalimantan serve mainly Sumatra and Java.

However many of the deported workers have remained in Nunukan, hoping to return to Malaysia, just as thousands of others from East Java and Sulawesi continue to flow in to depart for the same destination.

Some 700,000 Indonesians were working in Malaysia, more than half of which are believed to be working without the necessary permits.

Critics have said that preparations for their return were too slow, blaming the government for its ineptitude in responding to problems at the grass roots.

President Megawati Soekarnoputri left for a two-week overseas trip just days after pictures of Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo helping Filipino deportees off a ship, appeared in several local papers.