Thousands of Burmese Migrant Workers Flee Flood-stricken Thailand

As much of central Thailand remains under water in the country's worst floods in decades, thousands of Burmese migrant workers left stranded by the disaster are making their way back to Burma.

Many of the affected migrants are crossing the Thai-Burmese border at Mae Sot-Myawaddy, where local sources say that in recent weeks, hundreds of people have been crossing the border back into Burma every day.

“There are a lot of people going back every day. At least three vehicles a day, each one carrying about 50 people,” said an ethnic Karen border trader based in Mae Sot, on the Thai side of the border.

“Some of them don't have any money. When they get across the border, they tell drivers they will pay them when they reach their destinations,” he said.

Nai Tain, who charges passengers 10,000 kyat (US $12) to transport them from Myawaddy to Moulmein in Mon State, said that he has seen as many as 600 people arrive in Myawaddy in a single day.

In most cases, the returning Burmese have lost their jobs in Thailand because of the flooding, which started in late July.

“All of my friends from Ayutthaya have already gone back because the factories where they were working have been shut down due to the floods,” said Soe Naw, who lives in Rangsit, an area just north of Bangkok that has also been hard hit by the floods.

Nai Pali, an ethnic Mon worker whose apartment has been flooded for the past five days, said he was planning to return to Burma until conditions improved in Thailand.

“It's better to go back home for a while. When it's safe here, I'll return,” he said.

There are believed to be between two and four million Burmese migrants in Thailand, although only 1,310,686 have officially registered as migrant workers.

Speaking with The Irrawaddy on Tuesday, Htoo Chit, the director of the Grassroots Human Rights Education and Development project, which is currently trying to provide emergency food supplies to all affected Burmese migrants in the devastated region, said that there are about 30,000 Burmese migrants in Nakhon Sawan Province alone.

He said that in Ayutthaya, there are more than 1,000 Burmese factory and construction workers in urgent need of assistance.

Meanwhile, several Burmese migrants reported that they have not received any food from Thai donors contributing to the relief efforts.

“They only give food their own people. They can see that we don't have anything to eat, but they won't give us any food,” said Nai Thut, a Mon construction worker living in Rangsit.

He said he wanted to go back to Burma, but his employer won't give him his work ID because he wants him to remain on the work site.

The flood disaster has affected 27 of Thailand's 76 provinces. Among the most severely affected are the central provinces of Ayutthaya, Pathum Thani and Nonthaburi.

The Thai Labor Ministry said that more than 260,000 people had lost jobs and 6,533 businesses nationwide had to close due to floods in the period Oct 10-12. Thailand's Central Bank estimated last week that the total cost of the floods could be 100 billion baht ($3.3 billion).

By Lawi Weng
Published on October 18, 2011
The Irrawaddy
http://www.irrawaddy.org/