Protection for workers

Protection for workers

Near the end of 1994, a married Indonesian couple working in Saudi Arabia was beheaded for killing their employer. The act was committed by the husband in defense of his wife, who was about to be abused by the employer. In Indonesia the case was met with indifference. Apparently, nobody felt any sense of responsibility for the incident, which took the lives of two persons.

Reactions to the case were very much different from, say, those we saw in the case of Flor Contemplacion, the Filipina maid who was hanged in Singapore. There, the incident had wide repercussions and shocked both the people and the government of the Philippines.

It is because of such a situation that President Soeharto felt it prudent to arouse our conscience to the fate of our workers abroad. In an address to the participants in a national conference by the Ministry of Manpower on Wednesday, the President asked all Indonesian embassies abroad to protect Indonesian workers. Our embassies have also been asked to pay greater attention to the lot of Indonesian workers and provide them with assistance whenever necessary.

Perhaps we do not want to follow the Philippine example entirely. However, their example of caring for the fate of their workers is worth following. After all, the courage of our workers in taking up employment in a foreign country has helped us solve a number of our considerable manpower problems at home. The money they send home has helped raise the living standards of their families. By the year 2000 the foreign exchange they'll be earning will total no less than US$12 billion a year.

Considering all that, it would only be proper to give them better protection.

-- Bisnis Indonesia, Jakarta