Indonesia to blacklist employers who mistreat workers

PETALING JAYA: Five Malaysians are in the process of being blacklisted by the Indonesian embassy for mistreating its migrant workers, says the republic’s envoy.

Ambassador Hermono said the five would not be allowed to enter Indonesia.

This policy was drafted in response to continuing cases of exploitation and abuse of Indonesian workers, he added.

The five people include a couple recently acquitted of human trafficking with regards to their domestic worker.

They denied having employed the woman seven years ago and refused to pay her salary.

Hermono said the embassy needed to look into the legal aspects of the case first.

“If the employers keep denying their obligation to pay the salary owed, then we will put their names on the list,” he said when interviewed yesterday.

On the recruitment of Indonesian domestic workers, Hermono said the proposed One Channel System (OCS) has yet to be implemented.

He claimed that Malaysian authorities needed more time to update the system on their side before it is fully operational.

However, he added that around 1,600 employment contracts have been processed by the embassy’s internal system, out of which, about 600 workers have arrived in the country.

The implementation of the OCS has been in limbo despite having been agreed upon by both governments through a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed in April.

Asked if there would be any reviews needed following the change in government in Malaysia, the envoy said that the agreement would continue as agreed upon.

“A review mechanism can be carried out in the next Joint Working Group (JWG) to ensure the implementation of the MOU,” Hermono added.

The JWG is held occasionally between both governments to evaluate the progress of the MOU implementation.

National Association of Human Resources Malaysia president Zarina Ismail said that she hoped the implementation can be expedited to speed up recruitment.

“The high demand for domestic workers remains a concern and the lengthy process would be costly.

“Sometimes the process could take up to two months, in some cases even longer. When this happens, it also leads to an increase of costs from both parties,” she said.

Zarina added that the delay in processing could also lead to employers to withdraw their applications, in which case registered agencies then have to return their deposits.

“The money taken as a deposit would have been used to pay the prospective agencies in the source country to process the workers,” she said.