Enough is enough

By BusinessMirror, 9 Jan 2020

The discovery of the mutilated body of Joanna Demafelis in a freezer in Kuwait, in February 2018, so outraged President Duterte, who called her death a “national shame” and ordered a ban on the deployment of Filipino workers to Kuwait. The Kuwaiti government panicked, and sent high-level delegates to Manila to forge an agreement for the protection of Filipino household service workers in their employ.

The overseast Filipino workers protection agreement was important because, on top of the gruesome death of Demafelis, the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) recorded a total of 196 deaths of Filipino workers in the Gulf country since 2016. This figure is on top of 6,000 cases of abuse, sexual harassment and rape filed with the Philippine Embassy in 2017. All these, however, were set aside when the government of Kuwait agreed to do its part to protect our OFWs. We resumed sending maids to the Gulf country believing that we had the firm word of the Kuwaiti government.

The recent case of Jeanelyn Padernal Villavende, who was allegedly beaten to death by her employer in Kuwait, shows how effective is our 2016 OFW protection agreement with Kuwait, and should convince Philippine authorities that the best way to protect our maids is to stop sending them there. Let’s continue sending our doctors, nurses, engineers, hotel and restaurant workers, factory workers and construction workers to Kuwait. But not our maids, who are the most vulnerable among our overseas workers.

There are enough documented stories showing how the household workers we send to the Middle East, particularly to Kuwait, are abused and treated as virtual slaves, working long hours without day off, and worse, raped and killed. In 2018, a woman from Negros Occidental who worked as maid in Kuwait told her brother she usually sleeps late at night and can’t even eat her meal on time because of her numerous duties. She later suffered from acute ulcer and malnourishment, and passed away a few days after she returned home.

We commend Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III for acting fast this time, banning the deployment to Kuwait of newly hired domestic workers after the Villavende murder. It is well that the deployment ban and moratorium on the accreditation and processing of individual contracts and additional job orders for domestic workers in Kuwait will take effect immediately.

Certain quarters, however, are calling for more drastic action. Sonny Matula, president of the Federation of Free Workers, wants the Duterte administration to impose an indefinite ban on the deployment of household service workers to Kuwait. He said: “The DOLE and DFA need to address the slave-like situation of our domestic workers and renegotiate our bilateral agreements to ensure that they are protected by imposing limits on maximum working hours for maids, like other workers observing regular hours of work. We also call to strengthen agreements that Filipino maids will no longer be allowed to stay in their employers’ homes, which will ensure their protection.”

The Blas F. Ople Policy Center, meanwhile, has urged the Senate and House committees on labor and OFW affairs to conduct a joint hearing on the Villavende killing. Susan Ople, president of the policy center, said a joint and independent probe by Congress would help establish the facts concerning existing monitoring systems for overseas domestic workers. She added that it would also send a clear message to the government of Kuwait that the members of the Senate and House of Representatives strongly condemn the senseless killing of another OFW. The joint congressional probe, Ople said, could also establish whether Villavende was a victim of forced labor trafficking.

Apart from Kuwait, the Philippines sends hundreds of thousands of maids to other countries where they also face abuses, such as physical violence, wage exploitation and deprivation of food and rest. However, Kuwait seems to be on a league of its own as far as treating our maids as slaves is concerned. We earlier cited OWWA records: 196 deaths of Filipino workers in the Gulf country since 2016, on top of 6,000 cases of abuse, sexual harassment and rape filed with the Philippine Embassy in 2017.

Enough is enough. As long as we continue sending domestic workers to this country, the story of abuse and maltreatment will just go on and on. The best way to stop this is to stop sending our maids to Kuwait.