Returning Migrants to Be Retrained

The government is planning to provide training centers for the thousands of workers who have been repatriated from Saudi Arabia after overstaying their visas to work there illegally.

More than 2,000 workers, the last batch to be brought home by the government, arrived in Jakarta on Wednesday.

Manpower and Transmigration Minister Muhaimin Iskandar said the government was in the process of preparing 38 training centers for the former migrants, most of whom worked as domestics.

“This is basically a business skills training which can be an alternative means for them to make a living for themselves and their families,” he said. “Therefore, instead of looking for an informal job aboard, they can have a job in their home country,” he said.

Roostiawati, head of foreign cooperation at the Ministry of Manpower and Transmigration, told the Jakarta Globe that the centers would be aimed at encouraging people to become entrepreneurs rather than job seekers.

She added that the centers would be established in districts where large numbers of the workers had come from, and would focus on using locally available commodities to spur business growth.

“Therefore, by establishing the training skill center making use of the local commodities, the migrant workers can use their skills to create their own jobs so they do not have to go abroad to work,” she said.

Muhaimin said that among other skills, the training program would include workshops on how to set up and operate livestock farms, clothing shops and beauty salons.

He declined to say when the centers would open.

Earlier, the government had arranged flights back to Indonesia for more than 2,000 workers who had overstayed their visas or who were found to have worked in Saudi Arabia illegally. Some had misused their hajj permits.