Women working overseas need better legal protection

JAKARTA (JP): A group of social scientists and activists called on the government yesterday to give better legal protection to Indonesian women working abroad.

Pande Radja Silalahi, an economist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that many Indonesian women are seeking employment overseas to meet the world market's increasing demand for female workers.

Silalahi said, however, that greater protection is needed for the 700,000 Indonesian women working overseas, most of whom are employed as domestic helpers and know little of their legal rights.

Over the past few years, more than 625,000 Indonesian workers have been employed in Saudi Arabia, Hong Kong and Malaysia. Last year they brought in revenues of more than US$282 million.

Hundreds of thousands of Indonesians work, mostly illegally, on plantation and construction projects in Malaysia. Local NGOs recently alleged that thousands of illegal workers are in detention houses and badly treated by Malaysian authorities.

However, the National Commission on Human Rights dispatched a delegation to visit some of the workers, and reported this month that the laborers are being treated properly.

A sociologist from Cornell University, Nana Chandra Kirana Soedjatmoko, shares Silalahi's views. She said over the weekend that most domestic helpers have little formal education and are unable to confront complex legal matters.

"Female workers are also prone to extra harassment," Nana told a seminar held to commemorate the birthday of the country's pioneer in women's emancipation, Raden Ajeng Kartini.

Nana pointed out that other unfavorable conditions -- such as long working hours, absence of health care and the uncertainty of their futures after their contracts expire -- are issues that need to be tackled.

Yesterday's meeting, held at Jakarta's Taman Ismail Marzuki arts center, was attended by various women's organizations as well as laborers, who performed a short play about the sufferings of Indonesian maids and servants working in foreign countries.

Stressing the role of migrant workers as a source of income, Silalahi said that the government should not only give women workers better legal protection but also more facilities.

"A domestic helper working overseas can earn $150 a month, or three times as much as a servant here," he said.

Taty Krisnawati, an activist from the organization of Women Solidarity for Human Rights, said that abject poverty in rural areas across the country has prompted hundreds of thousands of women to seek employment in foreign countries.(16)