Press Release
Capitalism Has
Dehumanized Indonesian Women Workers
 |
| Southeast Asia Main Flows of Domestic Workers |
In
Bangladesh, Pakistan, and other parts of the Muslim world, millions of women
also face back-breaking economic exploitation to provide for themselves and
their families due to failed capitalist and man-made economic systems that have
generated mass poverty, treated their women like economic goods, and have
failed to generate sufficient employment for the men of society to adequately
maintain their families.
Dr Nazreen Nawaz The Women's Representative of the
Central Media Office of Hizb-ut Tahrir commented in response to this dehumanization
of women in the Muslim world with the following:
1.
Despite the Indonesian government’s criticism of this Malaysian advertisement,
it is its failed capitalist economic policies that has pushed millions of its
people into desperate poverty, and created mass male unemployment, forcing so
many of its women to seek employment abroad for survival, laying the path for
their economic exploitation and mistreatment. 1 in every 54 Indonesian women
work abroad to help the family finances, many stripped away from their
children, causing them to compromise their important role as mothers and
nurturers of the future generation. Furthermore, Indonesia's high economic
growth has failed to solve the extreme poverty within its society, providing
indisputable proof of the erroneous basis and misguided nature of Capitalism’s
claim, that "economic growth is the primary means to improve public
welfare." Instead of generating prosperity for the people and raising
their standard of living, the capitalist economic system adopted by Indonesia
in actuality widens the social inequality of society and increases the severity
of its poverty. The capitalist system has proven time and again to concentrate
wealth in the hands of the few while impoverishing the masses.
2. The
capitalist system, implemented in the West, in Indonesia, Malaysia and across
the Muslim world views everything as a matter of supply and demand and securing
profit as the primary goal of society. This dehumanizes women and men to
nothing but economic commodities that bring financial benefit to the country -
to use and abuse as desires dictate - regardless of the harmful physical and
mental impact upon individuals, or the detrimental social consequences upon the
family unit and society overall. This is an ideology that consistently places
profit over people, and finance over families. In addition, high remittance
from female migrant workers is not a mark of a successful government but rather
a failed one that has been unable to provide sufficiently for its women, nor
recognize its heavy duty of financially maintaining the poor.
3. In
stark contrast to capitalism, Islam does not view the woman as an economic
commodity but as a human being that should be protected and financially
provided for always by their male relatives or by the state so that they can
fulfil their vital duty as wives as mothers, while at the same time permitting
them to seek employment if they so wish. They should at no time face economic
or social pressures to work, such that their home responsibilities are
compromised, or such that they are burdened with the oppressive condition of
being both breadwinner and home-maker for their family.
4. The
millions of Indonesian female migrant workers as well as the millions of women
facing economic exploitation across the Muslim world today will face an
entirely different story under the Khilafah system that has a credible,
time-tested approach to tackling poverty as well as maintaining the dignity and
wellbeing of women. It is a state that implements a sound economic system that
rejects the flawed interest-based capitalist model of finance, prohibits
hoarding of wealth or privatisation of natural resources and invests heavily in
the development of infrastructure, agriculture, industry, and technology. Its
basis and policies therefore seek the effective distribution of wealth to
ensure that the basic needs of all citizens are fulfilled while also laying the
foundation for sound economic productivity to challenge mass unemployment and
enable individuals to secure luxuries. This will enable men to fulfil their
obligation of providing for their families, while at the same time the state is
obliged to provide for those women who do not have male relatives to maintain
them.
We
call the women of Indonesia, Malaysia, and across the Muslim world to support
urgently the obligatory work for the re-birth of the Khilafah that will
establish a sincere Khaleefah who will lift their economic burdens from their
backs and place it upon his shoulders. We call them to engage in this noble
political struggle that promises great rewards from their Creator (swt) and
will establish a state that will transform them from an economic commodity to a
dignified, protected, and respected human being - for in Islam the woman
deserves no less.
((الر كِتَابٌ أَنْزَلْنَاهُ إِلَيْكَ لِتُخْرِجَ
النَّاسَ مِنَ الظُّلُمَاتِ إِلَى النُّورِ بِإِذْنِ رَبِّهِمْ إِلَى صِرَاطِ الْعَزِيزِ
الْحَمِيدِ))
“Alif Laam
Raa. (This is) a Book which We have revealed to you that you may bring forth
mankind, by their Lord’s permission from utter darkness into Light.” [TMQ
Ibrahim: 1]
Dr. Nazreen Nawaz
Central Media Representative, Hizb-ut
Tahrir
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