Anita Rachman – A coalition of non-governmental organizations and human rights groups is preparing a draft bill calling for the protection of migrant workers' rights in a bid to push the government into ratifying the 1990 United Nations Migrant Workers Convention, a labor activist said on Wednesday.

Wahyu Susilo, a member of the International NGO Platform on Migrant Workers Convention, said the government needed to ratify the convention to protect more than 6 million Indonesian overseas migrant workers and their families.

"Since 1998, the government has repeatedly promised to ratify the convention, but so far it has done nothing toward that end," he said.

Wahyu, who is also a policy analyst at Migrant Care, a local NGO, said the government managed to sign the convention only in September 2004, and has yet to ratify it. Signing a treaty or a convention represents a supportive gesture, while ratification requires a country to adopt new legal obligations.

Data from the coalition showed that the number of Indonesian migrant workers had steadily increased over the past eighteen years. In 1990, only 90,000 workers left Indonesia to work overseas, but by 2008 the figure had risen to 748,000 workers.

Despite the increase, Indonesia has yet to promulgate a law protecting migrant workers and their families. At present, the children of Indonesian overseas workers have no access to state educational assistance, and the workers themselves cannot claim insurance for occupational accidents.

"Migrant workers have contributed a lot to this country, especially from the remittances they send home," said Wahyu, adding that once the country ratifies the convention, it would be required to follow international standards to protect migrant workers.