Eny Herwati – seek amnesty

The amnesty programme for illegal workers will happen beginning Aug 1, 2011. This column is a very personal appeal to a good and dear family friend with whom we have all lost all contact.

Her husband entered this country as a legal worker, although he should have come as a spouse after they got married in Indonesia.

She holds a valid and genuine red identity card which entitles her and their child to live in Malaysia, under the permanent resident programme.

But the husband’s work permit and pass had expired many years ago and he has chosen to stay on because of his family and he is one of our illegal immigrants today. Some employer has wrongly protected him all this while.

Now that the government, with the collaboration of the Indonesian government, has agreed to undertake the new amnesty programme, my hope, prayer and appeal to Eny is to tell her husband to seek amnesty. Since this is a G2G programme, things should become okay and fully legal. The husband cannot continue to living in the shadows of her life. What example of fatherhood would that be to the child? He must be in primary school by now. Eny last worked for us in 1995.

But let me tell you the whole story of Eny Herawati. She came into our lives through working for my brother’s family. She worked for them for almost two terms, and then when we needed help after our fifth child was born, Eny came to help the family of the then seven of us.

She stayed with us for two terms. It was during this term that we learnt about her predicament with her red identity card. She had received it but left the country without a reentry permit and was technically supposed to lose her genuine card, which she gained by paying an under-counter payment of RM1,500 after landing in Sungai Besar, Selangor, having risked her life and crossed boundaries illegally.

I had the red IC checked with the DG of Registration then, a friend.

He said, “It is a genuine and pure card and please take care to keep it.” I asked how she got it. His joking answer was very telling… “It is a million ringgit question!” I left wondering but satisfied that her IC was worth her risking her life and coming to peninsular Malaysia in a boat.

Then I was reminded that my dad too came in a boat called “ The Rajula ” and that he had made his life in Malaya and why should she not be able to do the same.

Chance encounter at Immigration HQ

The next challenge I faced was how to get her red IC validated although she had not taken hold of it before she left for home. It came the same day she left for Indonesia. One day I walked into the Immigration Department HQ in Damansara, praying and wondering where I would start. As I stood in line to buy some form, my good friend and colleague turned up, saw me, and invited me to have a teh tarik with him.

He was then the deputy DG of Immigration. He volunteered to help me solve whatever problem I had because I had been one of his instructors at Intan. That was the grace of God in Eny’s life. And, solve the problem he did, because when she was leaving again, she was stopped for almost four hours at the Subang Terminal and the uniformed officers insisted that only the minister could approve such an oversight.

They only released her to fly home after they spoke to my friend over the phone.

In that trip home, Eny got married and her husband came to Malaya through legal means. Then they had a child and then when he had to return before he could renew his work permit, he was afraid that he could never return to Malaysia. He then decided to break ranks and join the other illegals in Malaysia.

I warned him again this and in fact told Eny that I did not want to see him because if I did I would have to get him arrested. Eny still visited us from time to time and they were doing fine, except that husband was not recorded as the father of the child and he existed physically as husband and father; but not legally so.

The child was registered in school and I even told Eny to get her imam’s help to get the husband recognised as the father and to get his name legally into the formal documents. I have not seen Eny for at least five years now.

Therefore, this is my appeal to Eny Herawati… please tell your husband to take the risk and seek amnesty. This is his last chance to put right what God has allowed but man by willful disobedience has been careless with the laws of the nation. National governance is often compromised like this and the net result are the families who lose the role model fathers by illegal and other not so ‘ halal ’ ways.

Eny last worked at the KLCC complex with a cleaner company and lived in Ampang Hilir where there is a large Indonesian community. Her husband continues in the kongsi wherever he is working.

The foundation of Malaya; and now Malaysia

There must be hundreds and thousands of similar stories, because that is the foundation of Malaya; and now Malaysia; the majority are immigrants. Truth be told, except for all natives of Malaya, Sabah and Sarawak… we are all immigrants with the only difference being whether we are 1st, 2nd or 3rd generation migrants. Who cares, because this is now our only home.

Homelessness is when one is not even treated like family when one is at home. That is truly when one’s God-ordained dignity is denied. God has allowed Eny to come to Malaya and even gain a red IC, after having risked her life in a sampan over the seas. Hundreds have died in trying to do this. God spared her life and now her husband is here, too, and last I knew she had one child.

Only the husband needs to be re-rationalised and allowed to legally assume the role of husband and father to Eny. The amnesty programme can allow this to be done. My prayer and hope is that this column will be read by Eny and she will convince her husband to do the same.

May God bless Malaysia as she hosts so many immigrants who help us build and develop this nation we already call home. We can give them a home, too. That is my sincere prayer for them.