Intl Migrants Day, Migrant Care: Road to Justice Still Far

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Migrant Care Indonesia executive director Wahyu Susilo said Indonesian migrant workers, especially women, were still far to obtain justice.

As noted in a written statement in commemorating World’s Migrant Worker Day, Wahyu opined the government did not comprehensively provide protection for migrant workers which was evident from several new regulations concerning social employment security.

"The instruments of migrant workers security are not merely through a scheme of social employment,” said Wahyu Tuesday, December 18.

According to Wahyu, the government had yet come up with a scenario on the transition of Law No. 39/2004 to Law No. 18/2017 regarding the work placement for migrant laborer abroad. As a result, he added, several parties made use of this issue to run illegal recruitment and human trafficking.

Besides, Wahyu continued, migrant workers did not receive full protection despite the issuance of Law No. 18/2017 concerning Indonesian Migrant Workers Protection by the government.

He assessed that policy issuance could not solve all those problems experienced by Indonesian migrant workers, but revolution on the paradigm of security management by proactively involving all stakeholders and the commitment of foreign policy in providing security for Indonesian laborers overseas.

The issue, he said, was supported with the meeting fo UN Global Compact For Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration in early December. “The session aims at ensuring that migrant workers have rights to sovereignty and dignity,” he concluded.