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Valeria Mongelli

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11 images Created 28 Oct 2020

Life in Mae Sot, the migratory gateway to Thailand

As the Covid-19 crisis decimated the economy in Thailand and worldwide, migrant workers have been hit hardest. Mae Sot is the main entry point into western Thailand and a trade hub home to about 430 factories and at least 44,500 workers - mainly migrants seeking to make money to send back to their families. Since the beginning of the Covid-19 outbreak, factories have cut their workforce and laid off hundreds of workers. Others were allegedly pressured to resign so they could not be entitled to any severance pay. Nu Nu Yee (a pseudonym), a Burmese 21-year-old migrant, worked in a garment factory in Mae Sot. She allegedly endured five years of verbal abuse and bullying at work. She resigned during the Covid-19 crisis and remained unemployed, with no chances of returning to Myanmar due to the closure of the borders. Kyaw Zay Ya, another Burmese factory worker, launched a legal action to demand compensation after losing his job during the pandemic. As Covid-19 ravages his home country he, like many others, struggles to survive. This story has been published in El País and the Myanmar Times:
https://elpais.com/elpais/2020/12/11/album/1607674181_828853.html
https://www.mmtimes.com/gallery/thailands-migrant-factory-workers-denounce-harassment-and-labor-rights-violations-during
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  • Nu Nu Yee (a pseudonym) is a Burmese 21-year-old migrant in Mae Sot, at the Thailand-Myanmar border. She used to work at Top Form Brassiere Co., a unit of a Hong Kong-listed company, Top Form International Ltd. She allegedly endured five years of verbal abuse and bullying at work. She resigned during the Covid-19 crisis and remained unemployed, with no chances of returning to her home country due to the closure of borders.
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  • Nu Nu Yee is portrayed wearing the Top Form uniform. She is the eldest daughter in a family of farmers and, according to the tradition, she has to work to support her family. She arrived in Thailand at the age of 16 with a legal work permit and started working in the packing department of one of the Top Form units in Mae Sot. She reports that workers in the production line were repeatedly bullied by their supervisors. Every worker should achieve a target of efficiency. If they do not do that, the line supervisor yells at them saying things like: “Other people can do this with their two hands. You also have two hands. Are you brainless or stupid?” When this happened, she recalls, “Everyone was looking at me and I felt ashamed.” Workers also need to ask permission when they go to the restroom. Their supervisor takes the time stamp both when they leave the line and when they come back. If they stay too long, they will be bullied too. A line supervisor and an engineer of Top Form, who prefer not to be named, confirmed Nu Nu Yee's reports. Workers can denounce the abuses to the Human Resources department. “But they prefer not to do that.” The unit where Nu Nu Yee worked closed during the Covid-19 crisis due to production cuts. She was moved to another department, where she would have to learn a whole new set of skills. But she decided to resign. Many factory workers received pressures to resign during the Covid-19 crisis so they would not be entitled to any severance pay, said the lawyer of the Labour Law Clinic (Human Rights Development Foundation – HRDF). The HRDF provides legal assistance to migrants who experience labor rights violations in the Mae Sot region.
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  • Workers have breakfast in one of the units of the Top Form factory in Mae Sot. Despite the alleged reports of bullying and verbal abuse, the factory is a relatively good example. The Top Form workers who were interviewed report that all workers have a regular work permit and are paid the minimum wage (315 baht per day, that is ~8,60 euros). Suchart Trakoonhutip, labor rights coordinator at MAP Foundation, which supports the workers along with HRDF, told Reuters that “every business that invests in Mae Sot takes advantage of cheap migrant labor.” The Top Form workers who decided to return to Myanmar during the Covid-19 crisis, just before the closure of the borders, were allegedly fired and did not receive any severance pay.
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  • Nu Nu Yee shows her Tiktok profile on her smartphone. She has over 6,000 followers and dreams of becoming a social media star. After she resigned, she started to look for a job in Thailand. However, since she did not give any notice to the company, she does not have the necessary papers to look for another job. She says that she would like to go back to her place as soon as possible and open a clothing shop. “But it is difficult to find a job in Myanmar,” she says. Myanmar is now ravaged by a violent second wave of Covid-19.
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  • A man holding an umbrella walks through the security checkpoint at the Mae Sot border. The migrants who legally come to Thailand have to cross this point to enter the country. The checkpoint is currently closed and Thailand's borders have been shut down since the Covid-19 outbreak.
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  • A view of the Burmese town of Myawaddy from the Thai side. Myanmar and Thailand are only separated by the narrow, cocoa-brown Moei River. Many Burmese cross it illegally to enter Thailand.
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  • A view of a house next to the border between Thailand and Myanmar, in the outskirts of Mae Sot.
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  • Kyaw Zay Ya, 43, used to work as an accountant at the Royal Knitting Limited factory in Mae Sot. The factory was closed in April 2020, allegedly due to the Covid-19 crisis. All workers were fired without notice and only got a compensation of 2,500 baht (~68 euros), independently of how many years they worked there. “Some have worked there for over 20 years,” says Kyaw Zay Ya. Before the factory closed down, the workers were paid between 100 and 200 baht per day, which is well below the minimum wage (315 baht). According to the lawyer of the Labor Law Clinic in Mae Sot, many factory owners used the Covid-19 crisis as an excuse to shut unprofitable businesses, so they were not obliged to compensate adequately their employees.
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  • Kyaw Zay Ya is portrayed outside his home in Mae Sot. Together with other factory workers, he went to the Labor Law Clinic to launch a legal action against his former employer. He became the leader of the court case. “I feel angry about the situation,” he says. “I have been working in that factory for more than 10 years.” Currently, the case is still under examination. When he is asked for permission to publish his name and portrait, he says: “ Show my face. I am telling the truth.”
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  • A close-up of Kyaw Zay Ya. He is currently unemployed. In order to pay his daily expenses, he rents the room where he lives (about 20 square meters) to two more men. He has two sons of 17 and 10 who live in Myanmar with their parents. “Once the case is closed,” he says, “I would like to go back to Myanmar.”
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  • A man holds his bike while crossing the road to the checkpoint at the Thailand-Myanmar border in Mae Sot. According to a report by the International Labor Organization (Country office for Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos), Covid-19 heavily affected migrant workers in Thailand, who perceived a general deterioration of their – already challenging – life conditions.
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