Testing Times for Migrants

Covid-19 has slowed down life in major cities. The start of the transitional period toward the so-called new normal, with all of its strict protocols, is expected to give Man migrants a new lease on life.

KOMPAS/ABDULLAH FIKRI ASHRI

Andi Waruga (42) arranges gallons of drinking water at his home in Kaduagung Village, Sindangagung District, Kuningan, West Java, Tuesday (2/6/2020). Andi prepares to deliver a gallon of consumer orders using his car. Covid-19 pandemic made Kuningan origin migrants like Andi unable to return to trade and eventually fought in his own hometown

Andi Waruga, 42, was busy organizing 19-liter drinking water bottles in his home in Kaduagung village, Sindangagung district, Kuningan, West Java, on Tuesday (2/6/2020). The chair of the Yogyakarta Kuningan Businesspeople Community was preparing to deliver the water by car.

“It’s not bad. I get a commission of Rp 2,000 [US 14 cents] per bottle. It may not be enough to buy fuel. I can sell around a dozen [19-liter] water bottles a day,” he said. The water bottle refill business belongs to his brother-in-law.

Also read : Conventional Trading Continues Despite Covid-19 Restrictions

For the past two months, Andi has become an impromptu water bottle salesman and deliveryman to make ends meet. Three months ago, he was an owner of a mung bean porridge stall with a monthly turnover of Rp 40 million in Yogyakarta.

“Due to Covid-19, the turnover declined by 70 percent. Most of my customers were college students who have returned to their hometowns [due to Covid-19],” Andi said, adding that he decided to go back home in mid-March. At least 5,000 migrants from Kuningan have left Yogyakarta. They arrived back home not with money but with a new set of burdens.

Due to Covid-19, the turnover declined by 70 percent.

Most of these migrants have ended up jobless in their hometowns. Before, they had been the ones driving their hometowns’ economy. Each month, Andi said, one stall would send Rp 3 million back to Kuningan. There were 1,000 stalls in Yogyakarta. The fruit of their labor in Yogyakarta can be seen in houses and places of worship in Kuningan – many of which are luxurious, with ceramic flooring and at least two stories.

The book Sejarah Kuningan (The History of Kuningan) by Edi S Ekadjati describes how people from Kuningan began to migrate in waves in the 1950s due to security disturbances created by the DI/TII Islamist movement that was centered in West Java. The second generation of migrants in the 1970s brought along family members, relatives and other Kuningan residents. Urbanization was then on the rise. Among their mainstay businesses were mung bean and other types of porridge.

Read also: In Sadness, They Share Happiness

People from Garut, West Java, relied on their tactile skills and became barbers in other cities to escape the threats of DI/TII. Many were successful. Now, thousands of people from Garut, especially from Banyuresmi district, are known as good barbers. However, Covid-19 has truly tested their resilience.

Kompas

Banyuresmi Village, Banyuresmi District, Garut Regency, West Java. From this village, many barbers were born who then worked in Jakarta and surrounding areas.

Rusmana, 51, for instance, has returned home to Banyuresmi. With help from his wife Tuti Setiawati, 48, he now sells otak-otak (fish cakes) as well as corn and chicken snacks. He markets his products via WhatsApp. His current daily profit of Rp 50,000 is clearly incomparable to his earnings of between Rp 300,000 and Rp 500,000 while he was still working as a barber in Jakarta.

“At least I can eat in at home. If I stayed in Jakarta, the living cost would just rise,” said Rusmana, who has worked as a barber at a West Jakarta mall.

Indonesian Garut Hair Stylists Association chairman Irawan Hidayah said that around 2,500 barbers had returned home to Garut since early March. Most of them had worked in Greater Jakarta and Greater Bandung before the Covid-19 outbreak.

Also read : Polemic Urges Reevaluation of Preemployment Card

Back home, these barbers switched jobs to sell meatballs, vegetables or snacks. Some choose to do construction work while others set up a barbershop in their own homes. However, their profit is not as great as it used to be.

Kuningan regency secretary Dian Rachmat Yanuar said the pandemic had disrupted the local economy. The regency’s budget would decline from Rp 3 trillion to Rp 2.6 trillion and its revenue would decline from Rp 323 billion to Rp 311 billion.

Now, the Kuningan regency administration is preparing Rp 9 billion for economic recovery, with a focus on boosting micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME). However, it is not yet decided whether locals with MSMEs in other cities will be included or not. Among the 11,000 Kuningan-based MSMEs, 20 percent have ceased operating, while the rest are facing a turnover decline of up to 40 percent.

‘Warteg’ woes

KOMPAS/FAJAR RAMADHAN

Tohirin, owner of Warteg Putra Bahari when giving free food to one of the beneficiaries of social assistance in Jakarta, Monday (30/3/2020).

Covid-19 has also hit thousands of warteg (food stalls typically selling Javanese dishes) in and around Greater Jakarta. In the past three months, warteg owners and employees have found themselves out of work.

Many have returned home, but this did not end their worries. Since late May, Dwi, 44, of Jatibarang district, Brebes regency, Central Java, has offered her plots of land for sale. She needs the money to return to Jakarta.

“I have no money to start selling again and pay my three workers,” said the owner of a warteg in Cipete, South Jakarta.

Before the Covid-19 pandemic and the large-scale social restrictions (PSBB) that followed, Dwi had a daily revenue of Rp 3 million from her warteg, which she established five years ago. During the pandemic, her revenue plummeted to Rp 700,000 a day, lower than the Rp 1 million she needed to shell out daily to buy cooking ingredients.

I have no money to start selling again and pay my three workers.

Dwi is not working in her hometown. She and her family are living off their savings.

Meanwhile, many warteg employees do not even have any savings. “My salary is spent,” said Retno, 31, a single mother with one child from Tanjung district, Brebes.

While having no other means of income at home, she tries her fortune during the shallot planting season. Shallot planters are paid Rp 30,000 a day, lower than her wage as a warteg worker, which was Rp 50,000 a day.

Brebes regency data show that at least 103,516 migrants have arrived home during the pandemic. Of this number, 20,550 returned during the mudik travel ban, some using illegal travel services.

Also read : President Jokowi Calls for Expedited MSME Credit Relaxation

KOMPAS/FERGANATA INDRA RIATMOKO

Joint personnel from the police and military instruct several vehicles from East Java to turn back on Wednesday (6/5/2020) on the Solo-Semarang highway in Ampel, Boyolali, Central Java. Joint operations patrolled the city’s borders to uphold the ban on mudik (exodus) as part of the nationwide Covid-19 mitigation policy.

Return to Jakarta

Retno said her boss in Jakarta had asked her to return to work soon. However, the boss did not want to help her process all the necessary travel documents or lend her transport money.

“It was hard for me to return home. Now, it is hard for me to return to Jakarta. In my hometown, life is also hard,” she said. Nevertheless, she remains spirited in collecting money as a plantation worker in the hope of returning to Jakarta.

Maman Abdulrahman, 48, said that he also wished to return to Yogyakarta and sell porridge again. He needs money for his wife and three children, pay monthly arrears of Rp 350,000 at the bank and get his children to a good Islamic boarding school.

“I will return to Yogyakarta. However, before selling again, I will quarantine myself to avoid infection risk. I will obey health protocol,” he said.

Brebes regency secretary Djoko Gunawan said the administration had prepared two policies for locals with jobs in other cities. First, it would help them process all the necessary documents to get them back to the cities where they worked.

Second, locals who cannot return to the cities where they worked will be given access to labor-intensive programs.

For these tough migrants, giving up is not an option. It is their resilience that lead them to their past success. Thus far, the Covid-19 outbreak has not seen them lose hope, or feel defeated.