Looking for the fall guy in times of crisis

One of the greatest defects of capitalism is the issue of crisis and boom. 

During a boom, the capitalist makes huge profits, take back huge bonuses and give high dividends to shareholders. 

During crisis and recessions, the big capitalist will buy the smaller ones, downsize, retrench their workers and besides that, they will lobby and cry for government intervention to bail them out. 

That is not the only thing they do, they will look for the fall guy. They always need this to deflect the people’s mind from the real crisis and culprits at hand. During crisis and recessions, they need issues for people to focus on, they need new enemies and they need fall guys.

Today we have a pandemic followed by a world recession. There have been reports on the rise of xenophobia and racism related issues all over the world. This is not new and quite habitual. 

The prejudice stigma has been recorded throughout history like the Jewish persecution during the Black Death, HIV linked to LGBTQ communities during the rise of Aids, West African during the Ebola outbreak and now the "Chinese virus" as described by US President Donald Trump.

So who are the fall guys during this Covid-19 led economic crisis? Definitely the immigrants. 

Trump on April 20 tweeted, "In light of the attack from the invisible enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our great American citizens, I will be signing an executive order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States”. So basically the fight will be now between us and them. Citizen versus non-citizens.

In Malaysia, who else can be the fall guys? Who can we retrench first? The fall guys are the migrants from Bangladesh, Nepal and Indonesia as well as the refugees from Myanmar, the Rohingya and others.

Lately, we have seen the anger and frustration levelled at migrants at the Selayang market as well as the boat people from Rohingya. 

MIC President SA Vigneswaran lashed out saying that the migrants have invaded the market. He blamed the Myanmar migrants for bringing a loss of RM1 billion to the food industry. 

He warned the government that if they didn’t handle the situation, it will be like cancer spreading. He also said the war against Covid-19 will fail because of the attitude of the migrants who don’t follow laws. 

Vigneswaran's comments are supported by many. Definitely if one was to ask him about Indian workers in restaurants and barber shops, he may have another position on that.

Many political parties and right wing NGOs too have taken this opportunity to attack migrants and refugees because they are the easy targets, they have no homes and most importantly they don’t bring in the votes.

In the last one year, I attended two town hall discussions on migrant workers; one organised by the Human Resource Ministry and Primary Industry Ministry, and one by the independent committee on foreign workers headed by Suhakam's Hishammuddin Yunus. This was the committee set up by the Pakatan Harapan cabinet to streamline the policies and management of foreign workers.

In both these meetings, attended by 80 percent employers and bosses – they lobbied hard and strong for the government to bring in more migrant workers. They argued Malaysian workers are lazy and choosy. Even former PM Dr Mahathir Mohamad has said this. 

During these meetings, the minority people like me will be advocating for more transparent policies dealing with migrants, advocating no cheap labour policy and better facilities for migrants – work condition and liveable hostels. Our views are very unpopular and we are always challenged to provide workers for these industries.

PSM with the Migrant Workers Right to Redress Coalition (MWR2R) have come up with some comprehensive proposals on dealing with migrants. These proposals had consensus from workers and even employers. 

What is even sadder is that the special independent cabinet committee’s report was never made public. It is our contention that this report will not be made public because it goes against the interest of the government and big businesses. 

Migrant labour is big business, if you don’t believe me ask former minister Zahid Hamidi.

Today, Malaysians are so alarmed with what is happening in Singapore. Singapore recorded a total number of 13,624 Covid-19 cases making it the most infected country in South East Asia. 

 It is reported that four out of five cases are traced back to migrant worker dormitories. 

We always look upon rich Singapore as our model and yet it is now clear the level of exploitation and living conditions of migrants there where over 300,000 workers live in cramped dormitories.

Now we fear those returning from Singapore and Indonesia. So we continue to find scapegoats to blame rather than looking for a more fundamental, substantial and humane solution. 

The world media, which is controlled by big conglomerates, continue to spread and promote racism, xenophobia and unscientific arguments to push their business profit agenda against the people.

In the business of looking for the fall guy, we all end up losing. It is only through building solidarity among the people from various religions and racial backgrounds can we overcome this crisis. 

In this time, socialist ideas like healthcare, food security, housing and living in harmony with migrants have become beacons of hope for the people of the world. 

It is time we rebuild the world for people’s needs and not corporate greed.

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S ARUTCHELVAN is PSM deputy chairperson. - Mkini