A 23-year-old Indonesian migrant worker was allegedly made to sleep at the “pasar malam” (night market) temporary food stall that he was working at and had to shower in a public restroom using only a bucket and the sink.
He was also reportedly unpaid for his two months of work after the food stall closed down and his employer took away his passport and fled, leaving the worker to fend for himself.
The story was told by the Humanitarian Organisation for Migrant Economics (HOME), a migrant worker non-governmental organisation (NGO), on their Facebook page on Friday.
Social media users were quick to react on the sorry state of the situation.
In a blogpost, HOME said that the worker, who is identified by the pseudonym Rudi, had seen a Facebook advertisement for jobs in Singapore and was promised a job paying S$40 (US$29.10) per day at a food stall with housing provided for.
After agreeing to the job, the agent that brought Rudi to Singapore had reportedly registered him under a social visit pass meant for tourists instead of a work permit, the blogpost wrote.
In April this year, Rudi was forced to work 16 hours a day from 8am to 12am at a night market temporary food stall in Clementi, despite being promised by the agent that he would only be working from 8am to 6pm, said HOME.
HOME added that his housing was the food stall itself where he slept using a thin mattress and a pillow, and his shower room was a nearby public restroom where he used a bucket and the sink to shower.
After two months of work, Rudi’s employer closed the stall, took his passport and left him without paying his wages.
When Rudi approached HOME, the NGO said that Singapore’s manpower ministry had reportedly not assisted Rudi in his salary claims as “he had been ‘working illegally'”.
Although Rudi was soon deported back to Indonesia by Singapore’s immigration authority, HOME said it was unclear if Rudi’s employer had been located or investigated by local authorities.
HOME has identified the case as a trafficking incident as “(Rudi) was deceived about his working conditions and the legality of his documents/stay in Singapore”, the blogpost said.
A “pre-departure video” was published by the Ministry of Manpower and the Migrant Workers’ Centre in 2014 to educate migrant workers about rights and employment practices before they come to Singapore. It is unclear if Rudi has seen this video before.
Coconuts Singapore has approached the Ministry of Manpower to obtain additional information about the status of the case.
