Pekerja Rumah Tangga dan Organisasi Masyarakat Sipil: Persoalan Tentang Ruang Kebebasan Sipil di Indonesia

Abstract

Domestic workers or often known as household assistants or domestic helpers are no stranger to their existence in the lives of Indonesian people, both in rural and urban areas. Domestic worker or abbreviated as PRT is a job where the worker offers services to the employer to do various household chores, such as washing, cooking, cleaning the house, caring for children, and other household chores. The existence of domestic workers as informal workers or domestic workers in the household has not been accompanied by clear and concrete legal rules to recognize and protect domestic workers in their work, so that domestic workers often become subjects that are ignored and underestimated, from a status that is marginal and does not exist, not even rare. Receiving treatment that is detrimental to domestic workers, such as violations of rights, sexual harassment, to torture or violence perpetrated by employers against domestic workers. Against the backdrop of cases of violations of domestic workers' rights, domestic workers have begun to have the courage to strive for their rights to be protected by the state. Efforts to seek decent work for domestic workers have been contained in the Domestic Workers Bill and the existence of ILO Convention No.189. However, until now the Indonesian state government has not ratified the Domestic Workers Bill to become the Domestic Workers Law. Therefore it requires the participation of all elements of the state including the government and civil society. Through Civil Society Organizations (CSOs), it is hoped that they can become a bridge for people's aspirations and voices to push for the ratification of the PPRT Bill. Apart from that, as a democratic country, CSOs are also needed to claim the title of a democratic country for Indonesia so that civic freedoms can be upheld for the sake of achieving people's welfare. Especially for marginalized people like domestic workers.