Advocating Women Migrant Worker’s Rights through Social Services Organizations in Malaysia

Dependency on migrant workers is a growing situation in Malaysia particularly the ones from Indonesia, the world's largest non-skilled and semi-skilled worker importer. Despite their decision to migrate in order to obtain better livelihood, there are various risks faced by Indonesian migrant workers, including exploitation. To this day, the problems faced by women migrant workers are mostly dominated by documents forgery, fraud, overstay, unpaid wages, sexual abuse, involvement in criminal cases, and other rights violations that are not in accordance with the proper work contracts. Indonesian women migrant workers are often segmented to work in production sectors, such as manufacturing, service sectors such as domestic work and the cleaning industry. This study used qualitative research with in-depth interviews and participant observation to access, collect the preliminary data from the government officials, NGOs and unions related to migrant worker's social welfare. The finding indicated that there were several migrant workers' rights that have been agreed upon to provide significant protection for migrant workers in destination countries whether they are related to employment or social security. However, with the different legal ratifications of specific countries, the destination country has the freedom to restrict any access to certain migrant workers' freedoms. In other words, protection is subject to the laws and constitutions of the country which have been formulated locally. However, in the case of migrant workers' rights violations, most parties work together to resolve the issues. This includes establishing non-governmental organizations to curb issues of social inequality that help all parties involved.