Protecting Indonesian Citizens Abroad
Around 6 million Indonesian diaspora living and working in more than 150 countries around the world that have different conditions and needs of protection, the task of protecting Indonesian citizens abroad is not easy.
Over the past six to seven years, the system of protection accorded to Indonesian citizens abroad has seen extremely rapid development.
Within this process, the most memorable moment was when President Joko Widodo incorporated the protection of Indonesian citizens as one of the priorities in his nine-point Nawacita development agenda. For the first time in history, an Indonesian president has included citizen protection in their political vision. As a result, the Foreign Minister also incorporated citizen protection as a pillar of foreign policy.
From this moment, the protection of Indonesian citizens abroad, which had previously produced a response only during overseas incidents that involved Indonesian citizens, has metamorphosed into the development of a complete system of citizen protection. Data collection has improved by integrating the data on Indonesian citizens abroad with immigration data as well as population and civil registration data.
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Work patterns and ties between the Foreign Ministry and representatives of overseas missions have been reorganized. The mechanisms for protecting Indonesian citizens in a variety of scenarios in certain situations and issues have been institutionalized, so that almost all types of matters now have a management scheme. The media, activists that campaign for the protection of Indonesian migrant workers (TKI) and Indonesian citizens, non-governmental organizations and the private sector have been invited to take part in the effort to protect Indonesian citizens. Protection for a growing new segment, Indonesian travelers, has also been accommodated with the launch of the Safe Travel application, which has started trending on Google Play Store in recent weeks.
However, if anything should be noted as the most important achievement in protecting Indonesian citizens abroad, it is the fact that this issue belongs to everyone. Any problems that arise in the protection of Indonesian citizens abroad will automatically trigger all protection and security mechanisms for Indonesian citizens, both domestically and at Indonesia’s overseas missions.
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Traditional and Nontraditional
With around 6 million Indonesian diaspora living and working in more than 150 countries around the world that have different conditions and needs of protection, the task of protecting Indonesian citizens abroad is not easy. So dynamic is this issue that the system that is built must be a learning system. There are always new phenomena and challenges every day. There is always something nontraditional that emerges every day.
As Alvin Toffler writes in Powershift, published three decades ago, “The illiterate of the 21st century are not those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.”
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In 2015, the government evacuated more than 2,500 Indonesians from Yemen. In a prior operation that involved evacuating tens of thousands of Indonesian citizens from Syria (2011-2015), the Indonesian Embassy in the capital city of Damascus could be used as an evacuation shelter and base of operations because conditions were relatively safe. In the Yemen evacuation, however, the capital of Sanaa was the most dangerous place, and so the operation demanded a new approach.
The government repatriated nearly 40,000 undocumented Indonesian migrant workers from Saudi Arabia without the chaos of 2013.
In the same year, the government successfully evacuated hundreds of Indonesian citizens who were trapped during the earthquake in Nepal. This was nontraditional protection, not only because this was the first evacuation of overseas citizens during a natural disaster, but also because it was carried out effectively in collaboration with the Indonesian Military (TNI) and environmental organizations in Indonesia. Also during that same year, the government repatriated nearly 40,000 undocumented Indonesian migrant workers from Saudi Arabia without the chaos of 2013.
A year later in 2016 was the year of securing the release of Indonesian hostages with at least four separate incidents: three in the Philippines and one in Somalia. The approaches used in liberating hostages in the Philippines and Somalia had to be completely different. In Somalia, the government succeeded in freeing four Indonesian hostages after 4.5 years of unsuccessful efforts.
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In successive years, hundreds of Indonesian citizens were involved in cases that threatened them with capital punishment, in traffic accidents, on sinking ships as part of the onboard crew, and to the unique case of Siti Aisyah, who was accused of killing the half-brother of the North Korean leader, as well as the repatriation from Syria of the children of former Indonesian followers of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). All are nontraditional phenomena of their times.
Covid-19 year
This year is the year of protecting Indonesian citizens abroad during the Covid-19 pandemic. On 15 Feb. 2020, when the government repatriated 243 Indonesians from Wuhan, the epidemic was still considered a traditional phenomenon, meaning that we could use the existing system to manage and resolve it.
The first principle during a disaster, both man-made and natural, is for the government to immediately evacuate Indonesian citizens to "the nearest safe location", once the chief overseas representative (ambassador) has determined that the situation warranted the Emergency 1 designation for Indonesian citizens in the affected area or territory. The second principle is that the central government must take over the evacuation process – in this case, coordinated by the Foreign Ministry – when the staff at Indonesia\'s representative missions in these regions also come under the same threat as the Indonesian citizens needing protection. When the Covid-19 epidemic was still localized in and around Hubei province or mostly within China, the Indonesian government sent an evacuation team to transport its citizens to the nearest safe location, Natuna, for quarantine.
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In the next phase, when the government of Saudi Arabia on 4 March 2020 temporarily closed Mecca and Medina for umrah (minor pilgrimage), thousands of Indonesian umrah pilgrims who were en route to Saudi Arabia, became stranded in Turkey, Oman, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates and several other countries. The ambassadors and consul-generals, along with their staff, intervened to help resolve the cases.
As the epidemic escalated, the protection of Indonesian citizens abroad entered a completely new phase from the end of February to early March 2020, when the epidemic spread uncontrollably to dozens of countries in Asia, Europe and the Americas, and their governments imposed lockdowns and other measures to restrict the movement of people. Most of these countries had large numbers of Indonesian diaspora or were major transit points for Indonesian travelers. Meanwhile, dozens of the world\'s major airlines suddenly suspended international flights, including their flights to Indonesia.
Nearly 100 Indonesian representatives, including those who had no significant responsibility to protect Indonesian citizens due to the small population of Indonesian diaspora in their country of appointment, suddenly had to deal with tens of thousands of Indonesian citizens who were stranded around the world and were unable to return or to continue their journeys to Indonesia.
In order to ensure the presence of the state in protecting its citizens, some representatives helped by providing temporary shelter or food until the stranded Indonesians could be flown back home. Some even bought tickets for Indonesian citizens from vulnerable groups who had been stranded. Ironically, many travelers who became stranded and needed the assistance of Indonesian representatives abroad had previously communicated with these very same representatives and had been advised to cancel their trips, but were determined to proceed with their trips.
All protection mechanisms for Indonesian citizens, including those that protect Indonesian citizens from the threat of disease, are built on the basic assumption that the threat is localized. Therefore, the citizen protection system worked well during the 2015-2016 Ebola outbreak in West Africa. Even in the worst-case scenario of a third world war, the escalation of threat is assumed to be measurable and that a safe place will still be available for evacuation operations.
Most of the existing traditional mechanisms for protecting Indonesian citizens abroad have suddenly become difficult to implement.
Therefore, the Covid-19 pandemic presented a new and unprecedented range of protection mechanisms for Indonesian citizens abroad. All countries and regions are facing the same epidemic, anxiety, fear, and panic. All countries are experiencing the same emergency. The previous norm of aid distribution from one country to another is now a luxury because all countries are running out of the resources needed to fight the epidemic. The worldwide movement of people has been reduced to the lowest level, whether by land, sea or air.
Under these conditions, most of the existing traditional mechanisms for protecting Indonesian citizens abroad have suddenly become difficult to implement. The principles of emergency evacuations can no longer be used. The principle of evacuating citizens to the nearest safe location is irrelevant, because there is no place that is truly safe. The principle government-led evacuation efforts, in this case the Foreign Ministry, also cannot be carried out because the scale of Indonesian citizens who need protection is too wide-ranging to be carried out within the existing capacity. Meanwhile, the other ministries that had been collaborative partners in evacuation operations are now focusing on handling the situation in the country.
Local solutions
In the end, protecting Indonesian citizens who are facing the global epidemic while they are abroad depends very much on the creativity, initiative, courage, and preparations of Indonesia’s chief representatives and their teams in the regions they oversee. Effective management must rely on local solutions. Fortunately, the government had successfully revived awareness of citizen protection over the last few years in its diplomatic machine, both at home and abroad.
We are now seeing how the diplomatic machine is simultaneously demonstrating its creativity in all countries with all attendant limitations, almost as if it were on autopilot. There is not a single chief representative who is not venturing directly into the field, along with their staff. Numerous local solutions that might not have been thought of before have emerged.
Although this is a completely new phenomenon, there are some common principles. First is the importance of rapid response. In an emergency, certain responses will be useful only at certain times. Responses that arrive late can miss the window of opportunity. Second is the importance of a feeling of security among Indonesian citizens who need protection. Because of the situation, the physical presence of Indonesian representatives may not necessarily mean that they are able to provide a quick solution, but the fact that the state is present is enough to provide a feeling of security.
Third, when Indonesian citizens panic, they put all their hopes on Indonesian representatives. As a result, citizens often have unrealistic expectations. The challenge for Indonesian representatives is how to manage these expectations so these citizens realize that the ideal option is no longer available under the present circumstances. Fourth, panic, anxiety, and excessive fear are enemies in an emergency and could be more dangerous than the actual problem.
While the majority of citizens in the country are staying at home (social distancing), the citizen protection machine still continues to work around the world. Millions of Indonesian migrant workers and employees in various parts of the world must be considered. Thousands of Indonesian crewmen aboard ships in the Americas, Western Europe and the Asia-Pacific must be seen to. Tens of thousands of students across all continents of the world must be cared for.
The staff that manage these matters because of a call of duty must risk contracting the virus -- and some have already tested positive for Covid-19 -- in order to provide protection and the feelings of security and safety for Indonesian citizens, and to show that the state is present. Of course none of them want to be called a hero, but they have done their work heroically. Let us not forget that, in the many parts of the world where they work, they are also vulnerable and foreigners themselves.
Lalu M. Iqbal Ma’ruf, Activist, Protection of Indonesian Citizens; Indonesian Ambassador to Turkey.