Golkar asks UMNO to legitimate 800,000 illegal Indonesian workers

(ANTARA News) – Golkar party asked UMNO, as the biggest political party of Malaysia, to legitimate around 800,000 illegal Indonesian migrant workers in that neighboring country.

The appeal was made in a meeting between the Golkar and UMNO at the house of Malaysia`s Vice Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak.

The legalization constituted a simultant effort to close all suspected entrants of illegal immigrant workers from Indonesia, so that in the future those employed in that neighboring countries would be legal migrant workers," Head of the Manpower and Transmigration of Golkar Exective Board Wongo Sinaga said in a Golkar-UMNO meeting on Sunday.

Golkar party won`t expect to have such illegal Indonesian workers in the future as slaves and low-paid, or even unpaid by their employers or being persecuted by Malaysian voluntary security, Ali Wongso said.

In the meantime, Indonesia should make such a big improvement in insurance system and protection of their workers in foreign countries in hope of being able to make a change in international community`s image of Indonesian workers.

The UMNO-Golkar meeting ended with an agreement on making a joint committee in 2008 as a follow up of the Golkar-UMNO memorandum of understanding signed on Friday evening (Dec 22) directly witnessed by UMNO President Andullah Badawi concurrently Prime Minister of Malaysia.

Vice General Chairman of Golkar Agung Laksono saw that the signing of MOU constituted an effective political track to push for further solution of various problems facing the two countries` relations.