Singapore-bound maids must travel through Batam

Singapore-bound maids must travel through Batam

Associated Press, Singapore

Indonesia will soon require all of its Singapore-bound maids to enter the city-state through Batam Island so it can better monitor their safety and whereabouts, an Indonesian Embassy spokesman said on Friday.

Maids will no longer be able to choose their point of entry but must take a 45-minute ferry to Singapore from the Indonesian island, said spokesman Chalief Akbar.

"It will make it easier for us to monitor the flow of Indonesian workers," Chalief said. "We are quite concerned with the high rate of accidents among maids in Singapore."

It was not immediately clear how Indonesia would enforce this rule.

The Indonesian Embassy estimates that in the past four-and-a- half years, 89 Indonesian domestic workers have died here, mostly from accidents in the workplace. Some of the deaths were allegedly falls from high-rise apartments while maids were hanging laundry or washing windows.

Also, by streamlining the immigration process, officials hope to have a better record of how many maids work in Singapore and who recruited them, Chalief added.

Chalief said the change will happen soon but that an exact start date would be decided by Indonesia's manpower ministry. He said further details of the scheme were not yet available.

Critics say that both Indonesia and Singapore fail to provide adequate safety training for maids, who are often young women from rural areas unaccustomed to city life.

In response, Singapore has issued maid agencies and employers a guidebook on dos and don'ts for maids, including safety tips on working in high-rise apartment blocks.

Singapore employs some 140,000 foreign maids from countries in the Southeast Asian region. About 50,000 of them come from Indonesia.

The new procedure will not apply to other types of Indonesian workers, Chalief said.