“The sweat of my tired body has become the moisture of the city, and in this moisture, I’ll survive. I’ll live forever.”

― MD Sharif, Stranger to Myself

 

Don’t Send Sharif Home

On 11 March 2024, Uddin MD Sharif was informed by his employer that he had just one month to find a new employer before being deported from Singapore, losing everything he has spent the past 16 years working for.

Sharif is a Bangladeshi migrant worker who has worked in Singapore since 2008, in construction, tunnelling and piling. Outside of his day job, Sharif is a poet, author, community leader and a passionate advocate for migrant workers’ rights in a country that too often treats them as disposable. He has written award-winning novels about his experiences living and working in Singapore and was the first migrant worker to speak up publicly against the inhumane transport of migrant workers in the backs of cargo lorries. Now, his home away from home is threatening to remove him from the city that he has - in the most literal sense - helped to build.

Towards the end of January 2024, Sharif’s employer said they started receiving mail accusing Sharif of owing debts to a loan shark, along with copies of his work permit and joss paper hell money. Sharif has never borrowed money from any loan shark or money lending service, and told his employer so. He suspected that this was a ploy to get him out of the country, and was very disturbed that his work permit, which he had to submit to many contractors over the years as part of his job, could be misused this way.

Over the next few weeks, his employer told him that more letters were sent to both the company office and the home address of his employer, and a threatening call was made to the office. Strangely, though, Sharif himself wasn’t contacted by the harasser. None of the mail or calls his office received contained demands about how much money was owed, how it should be paid, and to whom. When Sharif repeatedly tried to call the number his office said they received a call from, it was disconnected.

Sharif encouraged his employer to report the harassment to the police, trusting that the police would help put an end to their problems. In Sharif’s eyes, both his employer and he were victims in this ordeal. The police interviewed him on the matter, and subsequently, Sharif, too, filed his own police report and eagerly followed up with his investigation officer over the next 20 days to check on the progress of the case, but received no response.

In early March, to Sharif’s disbelief, his employer told him that the police and MOM had advised them to “send him back”, and that this would resolve the issue. Sharif was shocked that the authorities and his employer would come up with such a callous “solution” to the problem. Sharif tried reasoning with his employer. He had done nothing wrong. His work permit was obtained and used without his permission to smear him, threatening his livelihood in Singapore. He has a teenage son and a 6-month old baby, and is the sole breadwinner for his extended family. But despite this, he was given a termination letter which stated that “under MOM and police advice” the company had decided to fire him. Sharif felt deeply betrayed by his employer and the authorities.

Given a month’s notice before his flight ticket home would be purchased, Sharif managed to secure a new job within a week’s time, due to his dogged efforts. But once the new company put in the work permit application to MOM, they received a similarly harassing message, again with scans of his work permit, and the words “if he work 4 u, u pay!!”. Unfortunately, as a result of this, the company chose not to proceed with hiring Sharif, though he explained that this was a scam and he had already filed a police report about it.

To Sharif, it became clear that this harassment was a bad faith attempt to have him sent back to Bangladesh with no hope of ever returning to Singapore. 

So many questions remain unanswered:

• How did the harasser know of Sharif’s new employer, when he told no one which company he had secured a job at?
• What is the rationale of MOM and the police in advising that Sharif be terminated and deported, instead of trying to find and stop the harasser?
• What is the status of the investigation into Sharif’s police report, and what are the findings, if any? 

We stand in solidarity with Sharif and his fight for justice and the truth. Migrant workers should not, as Sharif says, be treated like “rubbish” that can be disposed of so carelessly. 

In June 2022, another beloved migrant worker activist, Zakir Hossain Khokan, was deported after his work permit renewal was rejected by MOM, stating that he had an “adverse record with a government agency”. After Zakir went public with what happened to him, MOM released a statement claiming that poems Zakir published on his Facebook about the treatment of migrant workers during the Covid-19 crisis were the reason for his work permit being denied.

Courageous voices like Zakir’s and Sharif’s are rare and precious in Singapore, where most migrant workers don’t speak up publicly about their suffering due to very real fears of being deported. We have lost too much, and silenced too many - we cannot afford to lose Sharif too. Sharif has spent more than one-third of his life in Singapore. He has wide and deep roots here, and it is an immense blow to have his job and life robbed from him, and especially, to be punished like this when he is the victim of harassment, deserving care and protection.

We call upon MOM to allow Sharif to stay and work in Singapore. 
We call upon the Singapore Police Force to identify the source of the harassment and put an end to it. 

#SharifStays