Posted by
wetbenang
at
Friday, June 29, 2007
WE ARE FAMOUS
When it comes to getting bad press, Malaysia is an over-achiever. The country and its people seem to always be in the limelight for all the wrong reasons, one after another.
The focus du jour is a certain murder intrigue, last week was the maid escape, and a few weeks before were the bocor brouhaha. So depressing, so embarrassing, so exasperating.
I was in Indonesia last week, and Ceriyati the poor maid made news everywhere. Her plight received the attention of all major newspapers and TV stations. There were demonstrations in the city, particularly near the Malaysian embassy, where her family members rightly demanded justice.
(I wish Malaysians were as spirited as their Indonesian brethrens, so that every time a Malaysian citizen is robbed, raped or murdered by Indonesians living here, we would all be motivated to hold demonstrations. And at the rate crimes are committed nowadays, we could hold demonstrations every day).
Anyway, a few years ago, domestic help abuse was rather unheard of in Malaysia. Often times, cases of abuse happened only in our southern neighbour. I worked in that tiny republic then, and almost every week you’d read of people somewhere hurting their maid. Now, it’s happening more in Malaysia.
According to a report by Foreign Correspondent, Malaysia has become Asia’s largest importer of labour, most of whom come from neighbouring Indonesia. Across the country Indonesian maids are keeping house and minding children, freeing up the country’s middle class to make money. Ninety five per cent of the maids are from Indonesia. Coming here to work is well within their comfort zone because they speak almost a similar language and most are Muslim.
But once they are here, the story take a different turn for some unfortunate few. Some are sexually abused, some physically harmed, while some others don’t get paid.
Officials at the Indonesian embassy in Kuala Lumpur, which has sheltered thousands of allegedly abused maids, say they have a pattern along employers’ racial make-up.
The Ambassador was quoted as saying: “If sexual harassment, it must be done by Indian ethnics. And for torture, slapping and so on, it’s by Chinese employer, while payment problems are from Malays."
Whatever it is, something must be done, and quickly too, to stop the abuse. There has been a lot of talk, but little action, taken. The onus must be on the government – both Indonesian and Malaysian – to work on the solution. Change the legislation. Introduce minimum wage. Give the maids off days.
And those who abuse their maids? Give them maximum punishment. Teach them a very expensive (and painful) lesson that they have no right whatsoever to hurt another human being. The miserable few hundred ringgit they pay a month (if they do pay) do not earn them a slave who’d be on their beck and call 24/7.
If all fails, perhaps we can all devise a way to let them taste their own medicine.
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No argument there! How can they abuse their maids dammit!
savante said...
1:00 PM
Hi,
I don't understand either. You have any theory, doc?
wetbenang said...
6:21 PM