There are nearly seven million Indonesian migrant workers
They work in various countries around the world
People often call them TKI (Tenaga Kerja Indonesia / Indonesian Laborers)
This film is for all Indonesian migrant workers located around the world
This film gives information on how to choose candidates who care about migrant workers
Choose Candidates Who Care For Migrant Care Workers
What I know is that the Presidential election is to choose our leaders to come
That's Presidential elections... If it's the current Legislative elections
it's to choose our representatives to sit in parliamentary seats
(Someone) Honest and responsible
Not corrupted, and can protect us TKI
To choose a leader who can create jobs in our own country
Meaning that Indonesians aren't always working overseas
Legislative elections are set to happen on 9 April 2014
Legislative elections are elections to choose parliamentarians
The government encourages voters to exercise their rights to vote
This is the parliament of the Republic of Indonesia
There are 560 representatives here
The function of the Parliament is for legislation
It makes laws
Rieke Diah Pitaloka has been a member of Parliament from 2009-2014
A function in addition to legislation is monitoring
How does the monitoring function?
But are the laws or regulations executed or not?
And if there is a case, can we encourage the government to solve this case?
For example, whether it's cases of violence against migrant workers, human trafficking, deportation cases
Which are now mostly from Saudi Arabia and Malaysia
That is the function of the House's monitoring
The third function is for budget policy
Why is the budget so important?
It's obviously important
I've repeatedly said that migrant workers contribute the most money into the state treasury
But what is the state of migrant workers?
Rieke believes that the current budget for migrant workers is still very small
Migrant workers account for 89 trillion rupiah of the State budget
That's equivalent to 178 tonnes of gold to the State each year
The people in this government are playing a role in the trafficking of migrant workers
Not the protection of migrant workers
So there's never been any improvement for migrant workers
Okky Asokawati has also been a member of Parliament from 2009-2014
Currently we are in the discussion stage to make changes
to laws regarding the placement of Indonesian workers abroad
Because we see that these laws address more problems
in terms of business, rather than the problems of protection
She noted that many members of the House are involved in the agencies sending Migrant Workers
It's important for migrant workers not to choose candidates who are involved in the business of supplying labor
In Jakarta there is an organization that helps migrant workers called Migrant Care
Choosing legislators for migrant workers is very important because
the right choice will determine the quality of the members of the legislative
who will be sitting in the House of Representatives and deciding their fate
Anis Hidayah is the Executive Director of Migrant Care
She and her colleagues actively assist in helping migrant workers with the 2014 elections
We hope the migrant workers will be intelligent voters
Not choose simply and make choices that can be justified
The first is to ensure the candidates of a particular party is known to have a good track record as members of Parliament
For example, how was the performance of the members of parliament during the last 5 years
Then it should also be ensured that the political parties have a perspective
on concern for migrant workers, and a perspective on concern for women
Also look at the parties and do not think the legislature is independent
They cannot make decisions on their own
Parliament members are representatives of a faction
In the House of Representatives it's called a faction
Factions are the representatives of the parties
So whatever party decision must be run by a board member
I think it is important to ensure that political parties don't have a track record as perpetrators of human rights violations
Because this will determine whether a political party has a poor track record of working for human rights
And it's certainly not going to fight for the fate of the majority of migrant workers whose rights are violated in various countries
In the 2014 election there are some political party leaders who are involved in cases of human rights violations
Migrant workers need to study more thoroughly the track records of the candidates of these parties
In order for electoral offenses outside the country to be followed up by the Election Supervisory Body
Anis has been documenting the kinds of potential violations in foreign elections
Of course there are election watchdogs but I think it's a small number overseas
Anis and her colleagues also develop guidelines for selecting candidates
Migrant workers need to be more intelligent and responsible in using their voting rights
We examine the track record of the candidates for the legislature
Migrant care alone has documented the track record of the candidates for the legislative elections
for 2 capital constituencies including overseas
from the perspective of the protection of migrant workers and it will be uploaded Migrant Care's website
www.migrantcare.net which the workers will be able to access
The first criteria is how to assess the performance of politicians
who have been members of the House of Representatives for the last 5 years
How do they fight for policies, formulate budgets for the protection of migrant workers
And follow-up with the government in matters of the protection of migrant workers
We also look at how they make statements to the public
Regarding the common problems of migrant workers
The use of the Internet is an effective way to search for information about the track records of candidates
The names of these candidates can be found by searching online records
You can check these candidates, click and find out whether they've fought for migrant workers
It's already an advanced age, migrant workers are already very smart at doing this
So search for these people and decide if they can be elected or not
I think they could ask "Mr. Google", in quotation marks
They can Google, they can look at a lot of online media
And according to my observations the names will definitely appear
if they frequently voiced or fought for the fate of migrant workers
Legislative elections will be held in the country on 9 april 2014
For migrant workers abroad it will be held earlier
It will be from 30 March to 6 April 2014
Be a smart voter
Five minutes at the polling station can determine your you and your family's life for five years
Every single vote is very valuable during elections in Indonesia
What criteria would you base your choices upon?
Someone who is responsible, always disciplined and professional discipline, and also... [laughs]
Congratulations on being intelligent and responsible voters
Choose Candidates Who Care For Migrant Care Workers