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Jakarta Post

Tourist visas often misused, minister claims

News Desk (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Mon, July 25, 2016

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Tourist visas often misused, minister claims On alert -- Manpower Minister Hanif Dhakiri (center) talks to journalists after a recent event. (Tempo/-)

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isa misuse and work-permit violations are the two factors that that have led to an influx of unskilled foreign workers into Indonesia, according to Manpower Minister Hanif Dhakiri.

“They come here on a tourist visa but they then use it to work. In other cases, we’ve found work permit violations such as those relating to the construction of the Jakarta-Bandung high-speed rail project in Halim,” the minister said on Sunday as quoted by kompas.com.

Seven workers, including five Chinese nationals, were arrested after they were caught illegally drilling at Halim Perdanakusuma Air Force Base in East Jakarta in April. The workers claimed to be taking soil samples for the construction of a planned 142.3-km railway by the Indonesia-China joint venture company PT Kereta Cepat Indonesia China (KCIC).

“They claimed to be managers; if that was the case, why were they engaged in unskilled work [such as drilling]?” Hanif asked. He was speaking in response to reports of a growing number of foreign unskilled workers in infrastructure projects in Indonesia.

Hanif said his ministry was continuing to work alongside the Directorate General of Immigration at the Law and Human Rights Ministry to prevent a further influx of foreign unskilled workers into Indonesia.

“We keep monitoring it so that work permit violations such as the one that occurred in Halim will not happen again in the future,” said Hanif.

Earlier, Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan denied reports that Chinese workers in Indonesia numbered 10 million.

“If it’s true that there are 10 million Chinese workers here, they account for 4 percent of the Indonesian population. That doesn’t make any sense,” Luhut said last week.

According to ministry data, the number of foreign workers in Indonesia reached 79,664 in 2015, up from 68,762 in 2014. Between 14,000 and 16,000 of the total workers were from China, followed by Japan, which reached 10,000-12,000 people, with 7,000-9,000 workers from South Korea.

“Many of them work in power plant projects [...],” Luhut explained. (ebf)

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