The Washington-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) today expressed alarm over Malaysia's plans to forcibly expel some 1.2 million 'undocumented' migrant workers.

"The plan, which includes recruiting over 400,000 volunteers to conduct immigrations raids, is a recipe for abuse," said its women's rights division (Asia) researcher Nisha Varia in Kuala Lumpur today.

Last week, Home Minister Azmi Khalid was quoted as saying that illegal immigrants would be expelled by year's end, with volunteer corps as well as special squads being trained to catch them.

"We think the government should really reconsider this plan, as it doesn't address the root problem of illegal immigration, and it prevents those suffering abuse from getting help," Varia said during the launch of HRW's special report on Indonesian domestic migrant workers in Malaysia.

An earlier exercise to expel illegal migrants in 2002 saw 600,000 workers crowding into ports across Malaysia in an attempt to leave before the amnesty period expired.

Those arrested were herded into unsanitary and poorly-managed detention camps, resulting in a number of deaths and illnesses, according to reports .

In one case, over 70 individuals, including children, reportedly died in camps in the Indonesian border town of Nunukan, across from Tawau in Sabah, leading activists to dub it as the 'Nunukan tragedy'.

HRW also said that legislative failures and discriminatory policies were main reasons for the abuse of Indonesian domestic workers in Malaysia, where laws currently exclude protection for domestic workers.

Missed opportunity

In its 110-page report entitled 'Help Wanted: Abuses against Female Migrant Domestic Workers in Indonesia and Malaysia', HRW said Malaysia's "blind enforcement of stringent immigration laws means that workers escaping abusive situations can be detained or deported without any access to services or legal aid".

Both governments missed the opportunity to provide proper protection early this year, when it failed to include domestic workers into the Malaysia-Indonesia memorandum of understanding (MOU) on migrant workers signed on May 10, said HRW.

While the two countries have announced that a separate MOU for domestic workers is in the offing, no timeframe has been announced, the group said.

Among the serious shortcomings of the bilateral accord is that employers and agents have the right to hold workers' passports - which would prevent workers from escaping abusive conditions, negotiating better working conditions, or demanding full payment of wages.

The accord also does not define minimum wage, work hours or rest days, or set minimum standards for working conditions. It does not provide remedies for abused workers or outline sanctions for employers or agents who commit abuse, it said.

Under the MOU, workers are also not allowed to organise through unions or form labour associations.

Indonesia 'inhibited'

HRW said the current bilateral agreement only "marginally improves" on the 1998 document by setting more rigid recruitment standards, but fails to provide protection to workers themselves.

This is also because the accord has "few mechanisms for enforcement and redress, (while) unequal power relationships between countries of origin and destination make it difficult to produce fair agreements to truly protect migrant workers".

"HRW interviewed several Indonesian government officials who noted that Indonesia felt inhibited from negotiating too hard as they feared that Malaysia would turn elsewhere for cheap labour," the report added.

One key feature in the bilateral accord is that migrant workers would have to spend a stipulated number of hours in training centres in Indonesia before being allowed to work in Malaysia.

But Varia, who authored the report on domestic workers, pointed out that prior training cannot be the answer to reducing worker abuse.

Instead, she claimed that training centres in Indonesia are themselves becoming sites of abuse, as workers are known to have been kept hostage in the often overcrowded facilities for up to six to eight months.

This far exceeds the three to four weeks that recruited workers are initially told that they would spend at these centres.

"There were cases of inadequate food and water, there were also cases of sexual harassment and abuse," she said.

"Domestic worker abuse has been getting a lot of coverage in Indonesia and Malaysia and one response is that they need more training. (People say) it is because of their lack of skills that the workers are facing these problems in Malaysia. It is the position of Human Rights Watch that the lack of education and lack of skills is never a justification for abuse."

The group wants the government to reform its laws and conduct regular monitoring of workplaces for abuse and create a proper mechanism for complaints.

"We welcome the fact that the Malaysian government has open dialogue with us on this issue. We also think that open dialogue should take place with local NGOs on a regular basis, so that civil society and the government can work to strengthen protection for migrant workers," said Varia.

Leadership needed

Also present at the press briefing was Tenaganita director Irene Fernandez, who took the opportunity to point out that another reason why workers are "undocumented" is because they have broken their original contracts with employers.

It would therefore be unfair to arrest those concerned if they are unable to produce their identity cards to the authorities when asked to.

"We are concerned that there are no specific terms as to how the government will deal with the 1.2 million illegal workers. Currently, the prisons and detention centres are full," she said.

"Where will these people be kept? Do we want to repeat the Nunukan tragedy or do we want to stand up tall to say we respect foreign workers?"

She also pointed out that Malaysia had previously embarked on steps to provide equal legal protection to foreign domestic workers - under the Foreign Workers' Bill that the Attorney-General's Chambers had began drafting around 1996 when a cabinet committee was set up.

However, the draft bill was frozen by 1997, apparently following the politically embarrassing memorandum released by Tenaganita on the abuse of migrants inside detention camps.

"The leadership must come from the current government. We should revive the Foreign Workers' Bill as we need a comprehensive policy to address domestic workers," Fernandez said.