Reshuffle puts 'right person in right place': government

16 News THE MYANMAR TIMES JULY 29 - AUGUST 4, 2013
Thai system fails Myanmar migrants
Illegal workers are dying unnecessarily because employers do not let them access the health system – and Thai officials are not enforcing the law
BILL
O’TOOLE
botoole12@gmail.com
NANG Lu first migrated to Thailand
from Shan State in 2004 with her
husband and two sons, then aged 10
and 11. They left their small village
south of Lashio, in northern Shan
State, and crossed the border illegally
to find work – just four of the 90,000
Myanmar nationals who migrated
that year, according to United Nations
figures.
After several years of working as a
labourer in northern Thailand, Nang
Lu and her family became legal, documented
migrant workers. In 2010, she,
her husband and their now-adult sons
began working for the property developer
Karnkanok in Chiang Mai.
The family lived in a community
with more than 300 Shan migrants
workers in bamboo huts directly behind
a plot of pre-fabricated homes
they were building for Karnkanok. Her
family and neighbours describe her as
“honest”, someone who mostly stayed
at home and didn’t cause problems. To
relax in the evenings, she liked to listen
to her eldest son sing and play guitar.
In early November of last year,
Nang Lu began to feel a sharp pain in
her kidneys. Normally, Nang Lu – like
the rest of the Shan community – relied
on NGOs such as the Shan Youth
Power Network for her general health
needs. For anything more serious, they
would go to one of the small clinics
nearby. This time, Nang Lu felt the
problem was serious enough to require
a hospital visit.
She first went to a hospital in San
Kamphaeng district near her home,
where the hospital staff refused to examine
her, saying she was not eligible
for treatment without a social security
card. She was sent home with a bottle
of antibiotics.
A week later the pain was still present
and Nang Lu was no longer able
to relieve herself. She went to another
hospital in nearby Doi Saket district.
While this hospital agreed to treat her,
she was told that without a social security
card she would not have access
to more specialised care. She was fitted
with a catheter, for which she and
her husband paid 4000 baht (about
US$135). The pain continued but at
least she was able to use the bathroom.
Several days after that, Nang Lu visited
a third hospital, in Mae Rim district,
which also told her she couldn’t
be treated without a social security
card and sent her home with another
bottle of antibiotics.
By the first week of December, Nang
A migrant worker from Myanmar on a construction site in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand. Photo: Kaung Htet
Lu was dead – seemingly from kidney
failure. She was 40 years old.
Her family has no death certificate,
but the details of Nang Lu’s final weeks
were independently confirmed by
members of the community and labour
activists who work with migrants.
Nang Lu’s story is sadly common in
Thailand, where migrant workers routinely
find themselves lost in a web of
inaccessible social services. As The Myanmar
Times reported recently, about
1.2 million Myanmar migrant workers
in Thailand are living without the
health care they are entitled to under
Thai law.
Under the current system for migrant
health care, workers must pay 4
percent of their salary to enter the Thai
social security program. Their employers
must also pay 4pc. Failure to enrol
workers in the program is a crime under
Thai law but many employers don’t
want to spend the money, so they don’t
tell their employees about the system.
Nang Lu’s husband said that when
she first fell sick in November, “we
didn’t know about the program”.
The head of the Shan community,
chosen because he is the only one
who can read Thai – although only “a
little bit” – said he has raised the village’s
health care needs with Karnkanok’s
representatives for more than
two years but the company has yet to
respond.
This, too, is sadly common.
“Employers have a chance to make
migrants aware of their rights,” said Dr
Brent Buckholder, coordinator for the
World Health Organisation’s Border
and Migrant Health Program in Thailand.
“[But] for that to happen, employers
have to pay a piece. So many
are not forthcoming.”
Phil Robertson, deputy director
of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division,
agreed. “Many employers would
prefer to not go through the cost and
hassle of registering migrant workers,
especially in sectors like construction
or agriculture,” he said.
Health care is not the only legal entitlement
that migrant workers miss
out on. While Thailand passed a law
this year guaranteeing a minimum
wage of at least 300 baht ($10) a day
for all workers, both Thai and foreign,
many migrant workers earn much
less.
The head of Nang Lu’s community,
who has been living and working in
Thailand for nine years, said he has
never met a female migrant worker
making more than 170 baht a day. Nang
Lu was earning 120 baht a day clearing
paths and hauling rubble when she
died.
Sources at the Migrant Workers
Rights Network said that workers who
demand benefits from their employers
are often the target of harassment and
abuse from their employers and local
police. However, they said they had not
heard any allegations against Karnkanok
of this sort.
‘Many employers would prefer to not go
through the cost and hassle of registering
migrant workers [for health benefits].’
Phil Robertson
Deputy director, Asia division, Human Rights Watch
Despite repeated attempts, The Myanmar
Times could not reach Karnkanok
for comment. Sources in the
region say the company employs more
than 1000 migrant workers in the
Chiang Mai area alone.
However, Thai Deputy Minister for
Labor Anusorn Kraiwatnussorn said
his department would investigate the
claims of Nang Lu’s family and take
appropriate legal action against Karnkanok
if it was warranted.
“We will force the company to comply
with the law,” Mr Anusorn said.
“Workers should have social security ...
Every boss should follow the law.”
Asked about the larger claims of
abuse and exploitation of migrant
workers, Mr Anusorn said it is not a
“big issue” and that he believes most
employers treat their workers fairly.
Mr Robertson, who has authored a
number of reports on the abuses migrant
workers in Thailand face, said
there was ample evidence to the contrary
and accused the Ministry of Labor
of “doing nowhere near enough”.
“The reality is that migrants really
have no leverage to demand that
employers comply with requirements
on wages and working conditions,” he
said.
“The continuous parade of abuses
migrant workers face, and the fact that
employers can violate migrant workers’
rights with impunity, is a clear
indication that the [Thai] Ministry of
Labor is doing nowhere near enough.”
He said he doubted whether the
ministry would be able to enforce the
law even if it wanted to.
“Labour inspectors are few and far
between, and they don’t speak Burmese
or other migrant worker languages,
and their priority is focused on
the rights and welfare of Thai workers
first,” he said.
“Registered migrant workers can
file complaints with the Ministry of Labor
but they are often scared to do so,
lack the knowledge about how to do so
or the language skills in Thai to pull
it off, and remain concerned that they
could be retaliated against.”
Dr Buckholder said he believes the
Myanmar government has a responsibility
to assist its workers in Thailand,
particularly before they leave
Myanmar.
“There should be an obligation for
the sending countries to educate migrants,”
he said. “The bottom line is
that a lot of good faith efforts are being
made to provide health services to
migrants ... [but] a lot more needs to
be done.”
Representative from the Department
of Labour in Nay Pyi Taw could
not be reached comment.
For members of the community in
which Nang Lu lived, worked and died,
there is little hope that living conditions
for migrants will improve. Speaking
to The Myanmar Times in Chiang
Mai, a Shan man – who works driving
a truck and has lived in Thailand since
2005 – said that even if more migrants
were aware of their rights and knew
they were entitled to a social security
card, he doubted they would be able to
get them. “These employers,” he said,
“are not interested in [our] healthcare.”
Dancing policeman ad lands organisers in hot water
NANDAR AUNG
newsroom@myanmartimes.com.mm
WHAT started as a simple, choreographed
scene for a vitamin C television
advertisement has ended in
charges for a dancer, a director and
the general manager of Mango Marketing
Services.
The advertisement, for the Vicee
vitamin supplement, saw Ko Min Min
Tun don a traffic police uniform and
perform a Michael Jackson-esque
dance at the crossroads of Anawrahta
and Sule Pagoda roads. Four other celebrities
– Bobby Soxer, actors Shine
Waiyan and Ma M Sai Lu, and model
Ko San Toe Naing – also took part in
the ad, which was directed by U Zaw
Ko Ko and arranged by Mango.
Immediately after shooting ended
on July 13, a bystander who filmed
the shoot put a scene from the advert
online, calling it “The Traffic Policeman’s
Choreography”. It quickly became
an internet sensation – but also
caught the eye of Police Major Thar
Htay from the Yangon Region Traffic
Police Force.
Pol Maj Thar Htay was not amused
and ordered police to prosecute those
involved for impersonating a police officer.
The advertisement, he said, also
caused the traffic police to “lose prestige”.
Police have filed three charges
each, including one for defamation,
against Mango general manager Daw
Thet Khine, director U Zaw Ko Ko and
dancer Ko Min Min Tun.
U Zaw Ko Ko said he was unaware
that they were doing anything wrong.
Regardless, he said, the video uploaded
to the internet was not the final cut
of the advertisement.
“I didn’t know that we would need
permission to use the police uniform
in an advert,” U Zaw Ko Ko said. “I
know that when we shoot an advert,
we need to inform and get permission
from the Myanmar Motion Picture
Organisation. Then, when the shoot is
over, we have to go to the Ministry of
Information to get approval from the
censors and often the ministry will
make changes. Now we know we need
to get permission from the traffic police
station, too.”
Lawyer U Khin Zaw from Mayangone
township said simply wearing a
traffic police uniform is not considered
a crime and if the case proceeds
to court the judge will consider the
context in which the impersonation
took place.
“If they took the uniform and tried
to pretend they were police, with handcuffs
or something, then it would be
clear … but the intention would have
to be that they tried to commit a crime.
Then, it would be considered under
section 170, the law covering impersonation,”
U Khin Zaw said. “But [in this
case] it was just to make an advert.”
Next time, he said, they should get
permission from the police station before
filming. He suggested the likely
outcome is that the three defendants
will have to sign a pledge not to do it
again.
But U Zaw Ko Ko said police had
misunderstood the advertisement,
which was designed to show that a
traffic policemen’s work is difficult and
if they take the vitamin C supplement
they will have more strength and feel
relaxed. He described the charges as “a
misunderstanding”.
“People will be satisfied when they
watch the full advert. But someone
took a video of the first shooting scene
and put that on the internet,” he said.
U Aye Kyuu Lay, a vice chairman
of the Myanmar Motion Picture Organisation,
said that when the advertisement
is complete it will still need
to be shown to the censorship board.
“The organisers will need to give the
actors’ names, the director’s name
and the shooting location when making
an advert. After they finish their
advert, then it goes to the censors.”
Daw Thet Khine, director U Zaw
Ko Ko and dancer Ko Min Min Tun
had their first appearance on July 17
at the Kyauktada township court and
were granted bail, U Zaw Ko Ko said.
A second hearing will take place on
July 30.
“I hope the case will be okay,” U
Zaw Ko Ko said.