If you piled them up the folders would reach metres high. Some are dusty. Some are clearly new. These coloured folders - brown, yellow, blue - record the fate of hundreds of Indonesian labourers. You won't find these folders in the Indonesian Embassy, but in the rather dingy office of a non-government organisation (NGO) in Jalan Raja Bot, Chow Kit. It is to this office of the Association for Assistance to Indonesian Citizens (PKAI) that Indonesian workers bring their problems.
'We receive their complaints every Saturday', explains PKAI President Khairuddin Harahap. The organisation commonly deals with problems of unpaid wages and accident compensation claims. Even death penalty cases. Sometimes PKAI is asked to help destitute migrants return home.
Embassy refused
PKAI is funded by ten Indonesians, including Khairuddin, who established the organization in 1985. 'We decided to set up this NGO because there was no one at all helping Indonesian workers here. Even the embassy refused to get involved in cases concerning them,' explains Khairuddin, who came to Malaysia in 1983.
Over time PKAI has become a lifeline for numerous Indonesian labourers, particularly those working in Malaysia illegally. A typical case is that of Erizal bin Azwar, a shoe repairer from Medan, who sought help from the organization in August 1994. His son, who was a baby when Erizal brought him over to Malaysia, is now of school age but is denied the right to attend because he lacks the appropriate documents. 'My son has an Indonesian birth certificate. I wanted him to go to the Indonesian school,' Erizal wrote. A forlorn hope, however: the Indonesian school only accepts embassy officials' children.
Uninsured accidents
Most complaints reaching PKAI concern problems of unpaid wages and uninsured workplace accidents. Sudarti, a maid from Malang, wrote: 'I am working in Cik Rosman Hasyim's house. I haven't been paid for five months. I work from six a.m. until two the following morning. I don't want to work here any more. Please help'. Stories of maids being beaten by their employers are also familiar. And because the employer usually holds their passports it can be very difficult to leave.
The fate of Warkum, a construction worker from Kebumen, is even more tragic. On 2 May 1994 he fell from the second storey of the building he was working on, breaking both legs. Not only were his wages immediately stopped, Warkum also had to meet the cost of his hospitalisation - six hundred ringgit (AU$300). 'I just want to go home. I can't work here anymore. Please help me,' Warkum wrote to PKAI. It seems that many workers who arrive in Malaysia full of dreams of improving their lot, return home with broken bodies. Like Warkum.
Raids
Police raids can also provoke tragedy, as exemplified by the case of Rakhmad Maridun's family. Rakhmad, a labourer from Medan, came to Malaysia with his wife, Amrina Harahap, and their children. Although she lacked a work permit Amrina took a job as a waitress in a restaurant order to bolster the family income. But, following a raid on the restaurant by immigration officials, Amrina was fined two thousand ringgit (AU$1000) and sentenced to six months' imprisonment. 'I'm only a casual labourer. My wages are only enough to feed my children. There's no way I can pay the fine', Rakhmad wrote.
Employers often refuse to pay compensation for workplace accidents, calculating that the victims won't dare to take them to court because of their illegal status. PKAI often becomes their only source of hope, such as in the case of Marsiyah Hasnawan, a Madurese woman whose husband was killed in a landslide. Marsiyah wanted to go home with her two children, but her husband's employers initially refused to give her compensation. PKAI's intervention in the case resulted in the company paying Marsiyah seven thousand four hundred ringgit (AU$3700). Clearly PKAI's efforts helped Marsiyah enormously. Although she never dreamed that when she returned home it would be with her husband's dead body.
Death sentence
But for Khairuddin the cases that have the most impact on him are those of Indonesian immigrants sentenced to death. One concerned Salidin, who was sentenced to death in 1992 for murder during a gang fight. Yet it turned out that Salidin had a strong alibi - he was at home when the fight happened. The murderer was in fact his younger brother, who had already returned to Indonesia. PKAI, together with the Indonesian bar association Ikadin, sought to get Salidin released. And succeeded.
'Saving someone from the death penalty is something you don't forget', says Khairuddin. And, up to now, fifteen people's death sentences have been converted to life imprisonment, thanks to PKAI's efforts.
This and the previous article appeared in Suara Independen,
January 1997.
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