Society: ‘They don’t want to sit with us’

HealthServe launched Singapore’s first migrant worker mental health programme in 2019. When the government confined workers to their dorms for extended periods during Covid, the local charity’s helpline aided thousands, their anxieties captured by the deported migrant poet Md Sharif Uddin:

Locked in four walls. Darling, I’m getting lost / I’m getting old.

Since then, privileged Singapore residents have become a bit more aware of the mental health struggles that migrant workers face, and the government a tad more empathetic. “To our migrant brothers, we recognise that it’s not easy because you are far away from your home and your families, and sometimes it can be very difficult,” said Dinesh Vasu Dash, minister of state for manpower, while announcing official support to HealthServe’s expanded programme to train selected workers in “psychological first-aid skills”, the first line of support for peers in distress. Over the next two years, 20 roadshows will also teach workers about self-care and the mental health resources available to them.

Any aid is welcome, given the formidable body of evidence showing that mental health issues are widespread among migrant workers—15-20 percent according to one estimate. And kudos too, to the government for collaborating with civil society on such a vital concern. Yet, even as we laud these efforts, it is crucial to keep hammering away at the systemic issues which create conditions for mental health crises in the first place. Jom has written about them often, most recently here, here and here. This time, we thought they’d be best presented in the workers’ voices themselves.

The terrible living conditions: It’s like the lack of oxygen. Some time, you could feel the lack of oxygen. You know like the humidity, like the [heat]);

The pitiful food: This catering food cannot eat all. Little bit only can eat. [That’s why we drink] Red Bull, [lots of] energy drinks;

The harsh working environment: Sometimes we feel back pain, sometime migraine […] too much headache. Too much pain...

The surrendering of rights and dignity: we are very scared to complain […], anyway because we work here, we take care of our family. Our family depends to me…[…] [I’m] scared the company catch me, send [me back] to Bangladesh and India;

The deception and the debt bondage: Some company don’t give the salary timely. […] So, in this time, we don’t have money to top up. We have a lot of loan in our country.[…];

The shame: …the locals don’t want to talk to us. Even they don’t want to sit beside, behind us [on the] MRT, bus they don’t want to sit with us. 

These voices were housed in a 2023 study, and together are illustrative of our global city’s exploitation of cheap labour. Mental health assistance is a small step. We have many giant leaps yet to make.