SINGAPORE – Mr Mohammad Shanta was just 21 when he came to Singapore from Bangladesh in 2011 to work and support his family back home.

“When I first came to Singapore, I was a general worker. I did concreting and manual excavation. It was very tough and hard work,” said Mr Shanta, now 34 and married with a one-year-old daughter.

Seeing that some fellow migrant workers held more senior supervisory roles like safety coordinator and site supervisor, he asked them how they got to where they were.

“They advised me to go for some studies,” said Mr Shanta, who along with other migrant workers received an award on Dec 17 for his volunteer work in the community.

Over the next decade, he signed up for courses in Singapore, eventually working his way up to becoming a workplace safety and health coordinator, currently earning three times more than he did as a general worker.

Wanting to pay forward the help he received when he first arrived, Mr Shanta joined a volunteer group at the Ministry of Manpower in 2020, carrying out translation work and engaging with other migrant workers on life in Singapore.

Mr Shanta said that when he first arrived here, it was very challenging as he could not communicate well in English, and he was not aware of the norms and regulations in Singapore.

“I realised that there were a lot of workers in the same situation as me, and who also suffer from depression.”

For their support of other workers in adapting to working and living in Singapore, 18 volunteers with MOM’s Assurance, Care and Engagement (ACE) Group, including Mr Shanta, were presented certificates of appreciation at an event to mark International Migrants Day in Birch Lane in Little India.

Also receiving recognition awards were 23 Migrant Workers’ Centre (MWC) ambassadors who guided and helped migrant workers to assimilate into Singapore society.

International Migrants Day is on Dec 18.

ACE Group collaborated with more than 100 partners to organise activities throughout the month of December for migrant workers and migrant domestic workers. To date, over 70,000 have participated in islandwide celebrations.

MOM said International Migrants Day 2023 celebrations were organised to raise awareness and build public appreciation of the migrant community’s contributions, and to foster connections between Singaporeans and the migrant community.

Addressing the crowd at the event in Birch Road, Senior Minister of State for Defence and National Trades Union Congress deputy secretary-general Heng Chee How thanked workers for their contributions to the development of Singapore’s economy.

He said: “The Singapore Government, the Singapore labour movement will do our best and continue to do our best to look after you.”

Mr Heng said workers can expect fair treatment and their healthcare needs to be taken care of.

In 2021, MWC announced the launch of the MWC Associate Membership for migrant workers. For $6 a year, migrant workers get life and medical insurance coverage, training and upgrading workshops, as well as telecommunications deals. Currently, MWC has more than 105,000 associate members.

Mr Asraful, 40, a Bangladeshi national and construction manager in Singapore who goes by one name, said he felt proud to receive an award for his efforts as an MWC ambassador for the past 13 years.

“This work is important, as we come from other nations which are very different from Singapore. So us ambassadors can give them advice to help them improve themselves and live well in Singapore.”