[Featured] Braema as an alumnus of the Diplomacy Training Program

22 February 2022

Braema Mathiaparanam

Photo of Braema Mathi


Role: 
Secretary* of MARUAH

Active in Country: Singapore

DTP Trainer and Alumna: 2006 Migrant Workers Program – Malaysia as a participant and 2008 Migrant Workers Program – Philippines as a trainer

Braema Mathiaparanam is a prominent Singaporean human rights activist, a former journalist with Singapore’s most prestigious newspaper The Straits Times and an ex-Nominated Member of Singapore’s Parliament.

Braema began her human rights advocacy work in 1992. She has championed gender rights, LGBTQ rights, civil liberties (especially anti-death penalty campaign), political pluralism, and the rights of the migrant workers in Singapore. Braema participated in two DTP courses – on the rights of migrant workers, and on Business and Human Rights.   

With others she founded Maruah, a human rights NGO, and led the organisation for a number of years and is now its Secretary.* ‘Maruah’ in Malay, Singapore’s native language, means ‘dignity’. The organisation is also the Singapore civil society focal point to the Regional Working Group on ASEAN Human Rights Mechanisms.

Braema reflects that defending human rights in Singapore is complex and challenging, and a difficult path to take. Work on civil and political rights is particularly difficult, given legal restrictions.  

Singapore has ratified some of the core human rights treaties – but neither of the core conventions on Civil and Political Rights or Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Singapore is host, rather than home, to many migrant workers from elsewhere in Asia, and their treatment is one of the key human rights concerns. Singapore has not ratified the Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and their Families (CMW). Many of these migrant workers are women domestic workers and advocates have used the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, which Singapore has ratified, to promote the rights of these domestic workers.

Despite the many challenges, Braema’s motivation remains high. She said if you are aware, often it stays with you. This stems from values built up within the home and reinforced in school.  

“When you grow up with this increased awareness, you see gaps, and you start thinking how to patch up the gaps,” said Braema.

She said one result of her attending the DTP training on defending the rights of migrant workers was to become more focused on including regional CSOs, diplomats, and representatives of the business sector in advocacy campaigns. She reached out to embassies of the countries sending migrant workers to Singapore to develop collaboration for the well-being of their citizens who are Singapore’s migrant workers.

“I contacted embassies such as Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, and Bangladesh, in the early years of working on migrant workers’ rights. Together we created a mutual-learning environment so that they could share and develop ways to offer more protection to their citizens working in Singapore.”  

They also encouraged embassies to also collaborate in defence of migrants and to learn from each others’ good practices. The embassies of Indonesia and Thailand introduced educational materials, booklets, and set up hotlines for the migrant workers as an outcome of this advocacy, following what they had learnt from Philippines.

Her reflections on DTP’s course on business and human rights is also highly positive. Before participating in the program, she said her knowledge of “business and human rights was very weak.” “I found that DTP program excellent and had effectively presented complex issues.”

“What was really good to learn,” she said, “was learning that European/OECD governments had specific commitments to guide the private sector on business and human rights – and the OECD Guidelines established National Contact Points that could hear complaints.”

As a whole she thinks the DTP training facilitators and the core content experts were excellent in mapping out the basic theories and the advanced knowledge that activists needed to know to spearhead their activism on the ground.

“It was intense upliftment in terms of knowledge from experts, an open discourse where I had many opportunities to ask questions and understand issues better, plus a reading list. All which help you to move fast in a short period.”

Braema thinks that against the backdrop of the renewed global attention on climate change, DTP does have the potential to expand its training work on climate change, business, and human rights. She said corporate social responsibility (CSR), is still the dominant mindset in the corporate sector. “This mindset needs to be pushed out to connect effectively with climate change. Business and human rights, sustainability frameworks, worker’s rights, meeting people’s basic needs to food, water are all taking centrestage now, more than ever before Perhaps DTP could ponder expanding its program into this sector,” Braema suggested.

“I still have all my DTP training files on my shelf. Anytime I’m unsure. I pull out those files to clarify. Or If I need to contacts to participants, I look into those files, to check on the participants’ lists,” said Braema.


*At time of profile in December 2021. Braema stepped down as Secretary in Jan 2022 but remains active in Maruah.


[Repost] Article by MARUAH Secretary Braema Mathi in Q1 2021 edition of “Directors Bulletin” published by the Singapore Institute of Directors

6 January 2021

This article first appeared in the Q1 2021 issue of the SID Directors Bulletin published by the Singapore Institute of Directors. Please click on the excerpt below for Braema’s full article.


[Repost] CALL FOR ENTRIES | #JusticeForWageTheft Poster Competition

5 October 2020

Migrant Forum in Asia (MFA), together with the Cross-Regional Center for Migrants and Refugees (CCRM) and the Civil Society Action Committee (AC), is organizing the #JusticeForWageTheft Poster Competition as part of the Justice for Wage Theft Campaign. The competition aims to raise awareness and visibility on the issue of wage theft experienced by migrant workers who have been forced out of their jobs, forced to go on unpaid leave without being given their earned wages, salaries, and benefits, and forced to return home into situations of debt bondage.

THEME OF THE COMPETITION:  Wage theft against migrant workers and all related issues such as non-payment of wages and end of service benefits, forced unpaid leave or reduced wages, and lack of efficient and just redress mechanisms.

The competition is open internationally. All artists aged 18 and above are qualified to apply and submit an entry. A regional winner will be determined for all six regions across the globe while a global winner will be chosen from the regional winners and will be determined through a panel of judges and via online voting. The selected entries for both the regional and global level will win a cash prize.

You may access the full mechanics of the competition via this link: https://bit.ly/2EHgdbT

To join the competition, please submit your entry via our entry submission form: https://bit.ly/3mQ3Ye3

All entries must be submitted on or before 28 October 2020. Winners will be announced on 11 November 2020.

Please feel free to widely circulate information on the competition among your network, along with the mechanics and flyer of the competition.

Thank you and should you have further questions, please do not hesitate to contact MFA.

Change is upon us, let us dare to make it a transformation towards justice and peace.


[Webinar] Online Forum on the Impact of Covid-19 on the Rights of Migrant Workers in ASEAN (18 September 2020 10am)

18 September 2020

[Update] Recording of the online forum is now available! Please click on link below to watch this on YouTube.


#InSolidarity – Appeal for smiley images from Singaporeans

3 June 2020

As you are probably aware, Singapore civil and migrant workers’ rights activist Jolovan Wham is being investigated for holding up a placard with a smiley ☺ in a public space outside a police station. He was alone. You can read details of this on his Twitter account at https://twitter.com/jolovanwham/status/1263022005223165957

Several people have also expressed their support for a more open and accessible civic space by posting images of themselves with a smiley on their personal social media accounts. Others have also sent Jolovan Wham their own smiley photos for his Facebook page (https://m.facebook.com/jolovan.wham).

MARUAH, as a human rights organisation, states again that amendments to the Public Order Act (2017) mean further restrictions, crippling civic space. Human Rights Watch, in 2017, stated that Singapore’s definition of “public assembly” in the Public Order Act is extremely broad, which means that it can be interpreted to encompass everything from handing out leaflets on the death penalty to an individual standing silently holding a placard. (https://www.hrw.org/report/2017/12/12/kill-chicken-scare-monkeys/suppression-free-expression-and-assembly-singapore).

We would like to invite members and friends of MARUAH Singapore to show your support for civic space by submitting a photo of yourself with a smiley face. 

Here are two samples:

Smiley - sample 1
Smiley - sample 2

MARUAH Singapore will collate the photos into a Zoom-style layout with the following message – 

We support smileys and individuals’ peaceful voices in public.

#InSolidarity for Civic Space
#InSolidarity Against the Public Order Act(2017)

Please submit your images to maruahsg@gmail.com by Friday, 5 June 5.00pm. Do let us know if you need any further information.

Thanking you #InSolidarity, 

MARUAH Singapore


(updated with webinar recording) Labour Day Special Webinar – Migrant Workers and the Pandemic in Singapore (1 May 2020)

27 April 2020

Organised by MARUAH with technical support provided by Shape SEA

Please check back this post over the next couple of days as we upload additional presentation material.

Labour Day is special to all of us, as workers.

Have a Meaningful Labour Day as we remember those who have lost jobs, our dedicated front liners, all essential workers, healthcare workers and support staff, NGOs, union leaders, the civil service officers, multi-Ministry task force, government leaders and international leaders all and you and me…

Why meaningful? These are uneasy times, also very special as it makes us understand more on the types  of jobs and the workers. What are the new norms? How do we value the work of each other? The invisibility of so many workers, some whom we have overlooked.

Thank you for your interest and time.

A Meaningful Ramadan to all Muslim views and to many Migrant Workers who are Muslims too.

– Braema Mathi, MARUAH Secretary

Recording of the webinar

Speaker’s presentations:

  1. “The dorms are not the problem”, text version of presentation made by Mr Alex Au of Transient Workers Count Too (TWC2) 
  2. “Co-creating solutions with migrant workers”, presentation slides used by Dr Satveer Kaur-Gill
  3. “Workers’ Housing In Context – Regulations, Reconsiderations, and Re-contextualisations”, presentation slides used by Dr Imran bin Tajudeen
  4. Presentation slides used by Ms Braema Mathi

Labour Day Special Webinar jpg