Caloocan employer facing criminal charges

MANILA, Philippines – An abusive employer is facing criminal charges after his two housemaids narrated their ordeal to media and the police yesterday in Caloocan City.

At the Women’s and Children’s Protection Desk of the Caloocan City police, Bebeng Tilanduca, 20, and her 17-year-old sister Jelyn, natives of Bukidnon in Mindanao, yesterday accused Monica Chua, 60, of 9th Avenue, Caloocan City of maltreating them.

Bebeng said she has stayed with Chua for some three years while her sister has stayed for six months. She said they were hired through a local employment agency identified only as MRV on 5th Avenue. The two claimed they have been subjected to several abuses by Chua and pleaded not to return to their employer.

The media and the police learned of the sisters’ ordeal through concerned citizens who took care of them at the Jose Reyes Memorial Medical Center where the younger woman was confined for an appendictomy.

Estrella Gromina, 53, who was taking care of a relative in the same hospital learned from the younger Tilanduca of the abuse she and her sister has been subjected to by their employer. She gave Gromina a cousin’s number and asked her to call Charlito Tabag, 23, of Ilang-Ilang street, Barangay Maysilo, Malabon City who promptly came to see her.

The sisters claimed they were fed spoiled food, made to work long hours and are not allowed to contact relatives in the city. They said they were not allowed to even look outside the house. They also claimed they have not been receiving their salaries since they started working for Chua. Gromina immediately contacted Tabag and helped the sisters bring their story to the media and the police.

Gromina said she witnessed Chua at the hospital demanding to take home the young woman against doctors’ orders. The doctors, however, prevailed upon Chua telling her she cannot be released yet.

The two told the police they did not want to return to their employer. The two have been turned over to city social welfare workers for proper disposition. –Jerry Botial (The Philippine Star)