PSM sees fault in Vell Paari’s ‘slave rescue’

MIC is treating the symptoms without curing the disease, says Arutchelvan.

PETALING JAYA: Parti Sosialis Malaysia (PSM) has criticised MIC’s plan to relocate the residents of Nigel Gardner Estate as a piecemeal solution that does not address the real plight of plantation workers.

PSM secretary-general S Arutchelvan lauded the move to rescue the Nigel Gardner families from their slave-like existence but described it as akin to treating the symptoms instead of curing the disease.

“The real problems plaguing plantation workers are low wages and exploitation by employers,” he said.

The situation at Nigel Gardner was exposed last week when MIC publicity chief S Vell Paari spoke to FMT about the poor families living there.

The estate is owned by tycoon Vincent Tan’s Berjaya Group and is part of the Hulu Selangor constituency, for which former MIC publicity chief P Kamalanathan is the MP.

Vell Paari said he was appalled by the living conditions there and pledged to start a fund to relocate the families to a place yet to be identified.

Arutchelvan suggested that MIC use its resources to come up with a comprehensive plan with clear objectives that would lift plantation workers out of their misery.

“In the early days, MIC used to tell estate workers to move to urban areas for a better living,” he said. “Recently, we had the MIC president asking Indians to move back into the plantations if they can’t cope in urban areas. MIC itself has got confused.”

MIC president G Palanivel made his call to urban Indians last March, after the government had agreed on a minimum monthly wage of RM700 for estate workers. The call drew flak from many quarters, including MIC Youth chief T Mohan, who said working in estates was not part of the path to a bright future.

Follow-up programmes

Arutchelvan urged Vell Paari to get government agencies such as the Welfare Department and the Health Ministry to investigate the situation at Nigel Gardner.

He added that PSM was willing to assist MIC in the best interest of plantation workers.

“However, I do not believe that relocating them will help them much,” he said. “Previously, when estate workers in Prang Besar were relocated to make way for the Putrajaya project, their lifestyle became worse and the community disintegrated.”

But lawyer KA Ramu, a DAP member who is familiar with conditions at Nigel Gardner, said relocating the residents was the best immediate solution for them.

“Right now, there is no national blueprint to protect the welfare of estate workers,” he said. “So, relocating them is the best alternative for them at this point in time.”

However, he added, there must be follow-up programmes to help them adapt to their new surroundings and make a better living.

“You cannot simply relocate people to an area without providing them with the necessary skills and motivation to cope with the new surroundings,” he said.

Among the most important programmes, he said, would be counselling, especially if they were moved to an urban setting.

“Without that, the community will falter and they will resort to crime for a living,” he said.