Indonesia: Catholics fight human trafficking

The Diocese of Maumere on Flores Island is stepping up efforts to protect Indonesian migrant workers from human traffickers. Next month, each of the 35 parish offices in the diocese serving Indonesians who wish to work abroad will start giving counseling services to them, backed up with advice from a private company that recruits such workers.

Local parish offices will assist Catholic workers in collating their documentation. They will ensure the workers have birth and marriage certificates and other necessary papers, while providing information about health, especially HIV/AIDS.

The diocese hopes that by ensuring potential migrants have proper papers and advice, those who wish to work abroad can avoid dangerous unofficial channels.

Hundreds of adults and children fall victim to human traffickers every year, according to Indonesian police.

In late March, Bishop Gerulfus Kherubim Pareira of Maumere approved the opening of a branch office of the recruitment company, P.T. Alfira Perdana Jaya, in the diocese. The office is now temporarily housed in the diocese's pastoral center building in Maumere.

The Divine Word bishop has also assigned four laypersons from the diocese's commission for migrants and itinerants, the diocesan Caritas social services agency, and the Church-based Volunteer Team for Humanity in Flores (TRUK-F) to run the office.

Indonesian migrant workers from Flores Island often fall prey to human traffickers, Vincentius Magun, the head of Tanjung Selor diocese's commission for migrants and itinerants, said. The diocese is in East Kalimantan, on Borneo island, and borders Sabah, Malaysia's easternmost state.

"We hope that the presence of a recruitment company will save Indonesian migrant workers from being trapped," Magun said.

Father Cyrillus Meo Mali, who heads Maumere diocese's pastoral center, said the effort is a follow-up of a seminar and workshop on human trafficking held last August.
Father Mali said Indonesian migrant workers have become a troubling issue for the local Church, which "has been trying to take constructive efforts to overcome it." This has included an investigation of the many problems facing Indonesian migrant workers.

P.T. Alfira Perdana Jaya has its headquarters in Nunukan, which is served by Tanjung Selor diocese. The diocese's commission for pastoral migrants and itinerants had recommended the opening of the branch office of the recruitment company in Maumere.

Over the past 10 years, about 1 million Catholic Indonesian migrants have traveled to work in Malaysia, particularly in areas served by Keningau and Sandakan dioceses and Kota Kinabalu archdiocese, all in Sabah, Magun said.

Yohanes Duli Gaharpun, 48, a Catholic who was previously a migrant worker in Malaysia, gave his backing to the plan to open the recruitment company office.
"It means people in Flores Island who want to work overseas will be free from human trafficking," he asserted.