Anti-migrant stance asking for trouble
The rapid rise in Covid-19 infection cases among migrant labour — thousands are located in Samut Sakhon alone — has caused alarm. While many resort to the blame game, linking this group of people to the new outbreak, it must be admitted that the infection cluster resulted from virus control mismanagement from the beginning — by lumping together migrants who tested positive with those who have been screened as well as those who are asymptomatic under the same roof.
More importantly, it must be admitted also that due to loopholes there are several thousand migrants in Samut Sakhon who do not “exist” in the state data. Without registration, this group of labour has not been regulated and — amid the Covid pandemic — poses as Covid timebomb.
The question is: How the state can access this group of migrants and take appropriate action? Harsh measures will only drive them underground. Or their heartless employees may dump them on the road like in the recent case in Samut Prakan.
The ongoing chaos indicates the government has had no solid plan to tackle the pandemic among migrant workers despite their high number, two million in official state data, though labour experts believe the real number is actually four million.
Whatever the exact number is, migrant labour, registered and non-registered alike, has received little assistance from state in the wake of virus outbreak. Their poor living conditions, with cramped accommodation, puts them at higher risk of infection. Those who are dumped on the roadside cannot return to their home countries as the borders have been sealed.
After the Samut Sakhon pandemic hit the headlines, labourers, activists, and academics told me they get little help from the Thai state. They have to depend mostly on donations of food and drinking water, masks, and sanitary gel from surrounding communities and volunteers’ networks. I talked to some authorities, and they said in one voice: “It’s not our job.”
This explains why proactive control work is lacking on the part of the state, several months after we thought we had successfully tackled the coronavirus. No contract tracing is taking place in migrant communities; state support mechanisms cannot reach the migrants.
The state was shocked with the Samut Sakhon outbreak late last year. The fact is they have ignored all the concerns and warnings regarding the trans-border pandemic as the situation in Myanmar was getting worse several months before.
Had the government put in place a migrant labour management system, we could have avoided the conundrum we are facing today. Such a system is necessary if we accept the fact that we need migrant labour who filled market demand in an area where Thais have no interest in working.
If we depend on them, we have to make sure there are no double standards in remuneration and welfare. At least, they must have a quality of life, as Thais do. Cramped accommodation and exploitation should not be allowed.
The government should spearhead moves to eradicate xenophobia and discrimination against migrant labour.
If we are to follow the Singapore model, as some state authorities have insisted, we must do it to the core, not just paying lip service.
The Singapore government has taken the lead by convincing its people of the importance of migrant labour, mostly from South Asia, since they play a key role in the city state’s economic development.
When the pandemic hit the country, the government launched major reforms of the migrant labour system that led to quick shelter building, and transformation of military camps into field hospitals where massive testing and rapid contract case finding were provided. The Singapore response is efficient and timely.
But in Thailand, it’s the opposite. Even though the cause of the Samut Sakhon outbreak remains unclear, we blame the migrant labour. Some traders refused to sell products to them, some bus drivers chased them away.
State measures, surrounding their makeshift camps with barbed wire, epitomise discrimination.
What is needed right now is a comprehensive migrant labour management plan that integrates several agencies including non-state participants since state agencies have no mechanism to access migrant communities.
We have to admit that our migrant labour management is more complicated when compared to Singapore’s given that the number of migrant labourers in our country is much higher.
Most importantly, more than one million of them are non-registered workers who, in the absence of proper control measures, are likely to exacerbate the virus situation.
The Dec 29, 2020, cabinet resolution that stipulates registration of all migrant labourers and rapid tests is not helpful without a revamp of the migrant labour management system.
The government cannot afford to drag its feet on this matter or the pandemic will get out of control, which means more losses of lives.