TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Manpower Ministry to sign regulation on social security for migrant workers
Change Size
M
anpower Minister M. Hanif Dhakiri announced recently that the ministry would sign a regulation guaranteeing social security for migrant workers in Indonesia.
He added that the ministerial regulation had been created to implement the mandate of Law No. 29 Article 5 on migrant workers. The new ministerial regulation, which would be issued later this year, would replace Ministerial Regulation No. 7/2017 on the social security of Indonesian workers.
Manpower Ministry secretary-general Khairul Anwar said that after taking quite some time formulating the ministerial regulation in close coordination with relevant stakeholders, the ministry was finally able to finalize it. Khairul said social security was one of Indonesia’s duties in protecting foreign workers in the country.
Khairul attended a meeting recently with House of Representatives Commission IX overseeing demographic affairs, health, manpower and transmigration to finalize the draft regulation, led by commission chairman Dede Yusuf.
According to Khairul, the regulation requires employers to provide four types of social security for migrant workers: national healthcare insurance, occupational hazard insurance, life insurance and pension fund.
He continued that the migrant workers would get social security benefits, including financial compensation for workplace accidents, before and after their postings in Indonesia. They were also entitled to training and mentoring from Indonesian coaches so they could do their work properly, he asserted.
He said migrants who worked as temporary workers in Indonesia were entitled to social security benefits five months before they started their postings (before they arrive in Indonesia), 25 months while they were working and maximum a month after they finished their assignments in Indonesia.
He added that for individual migrant workers who filled full-time positions, meanwhile, were entitled to social security benefits a month before they started their postings (before they arrive in Indonesia), 24 months while they were working and maximum a month after they finished their assignments in Indonesia.
Life insurance for migrant workers, according to Khairul, will be disbursed to their heirs should the workers pass away while being an active member of their employers’ life insurance program.
“The life insurance covers financial assistance and funeral allowance,” he said.
Dede said the regulation’s draft had comprehensively covered various aspects to accommodate matters related to the welfare of migrant workers.
“Now, we just have to make sure that the Manpower Ministry, BPJS Ketanagakerjaan [Workers Social Security Agency] and House Commission IX share the same understanding on how to implement the regulation,” Dede explained.
BPJS Ketenagakerjaan president director Agus Susanto, who also attended the meeting, lauded the ministry’s effort in increasing the protection of migrant workers through the new draft regulation.
“We hope that the regulation’s clauses will be regularly reviewed to evaluate the magnitude of its benefits in improving the migrant workers’ welfare while they are working in Indonesia and what we can do to improve the efficiency of this new regulation,” Agus said.
