REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA - A presidential decree on the extension of the tenure of the Indonesian Migrant Workers Protection Task Force (Satgas TKI) was expected to be issued next week, a Satgas spokesman said. "The presidential decree is expected to be issued next week. There will only be a few changes in the composition of the Satgas TKI management," Humphrey Djemat said here on Friday.

"Hendarman Supandji will no longer be deputy chairman I, there will be a new name from the attorney general`s office (to succeed him)," he said.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) would decide who replaced Supanji, he added. Other figures in the Satgas TKI`s management are Bambang Hendarso Danuri as chairman II and Alwi Shihab as chairman III. The chairman is Maftuh Basyuni, former religious affairs minister.

On January 5, 2012 the president said he would extend the working term of the Satgas TKI for six months because it had been successful in dealing with legal cases involving a number of Indonesian migrant workers overseas. Maftuh earlier reported that in 2011 his team had managed to secure the release of 37 migrant workers facing the death sentence. They included eight workers in Saudi Arabia, 14 in Malaysia, 11 in China and one in Iran.

The head of state told Maftuh that the task force should in future focus on providing legal assistance and advocacy so the efforts to help workers facing criminal charges would be more effective.

Yudhoyono further said that legal advocacy and education for Indonesians wishing to work overseas must be intensified so they would have a better understandng and knowledge of the legal system and the consequences of violations in the countries where they would work. He also asked the task force to make recommendations on legal protection measures for migrant workers before they were sent abroad, while they were working overseas, as well as after they return.

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