The unlucky draw....

In today's Jordan Times there is an article about the abuse of foreign workers in Jordan. The article focuses on Filipino and Sri Lankan workers as they make up the vast majority of foreign workers in Jordan.

Jennifer Perez, 23, recently graduated from a teachers' college in the Philippines, but she wanted to travel and work abroad. The dream became a nightmare less than a day after her arrival in Jordan. She is now quadriplegic.

The first official investigation as to how and why she fell from the second storey of the home where she worked as a domestic employee is under way. An argument with her employer three months ago resulted in what her “Madame” claims was a self-inflicted injury. Jennifer alleges it was attempted murder.

The Philippine and Sri Lankan embassies estimate that about 1% of their nationals are abused...UNIFEM chimes in with a horrific statistic of 50% of immigrant workers being abused worldwide.

It seems that immigrant workers (my focus, for obvious reasons, on Filipinos) get a raw deal where ever they end up as domestic helpers...be it Singapore, Hong Kong or elsewhere in Asia (even, dare I say it, here at home in the Philippines)....but it seems to me that the roughest hand that a Filipino worker could be dealt comes within the Middle East.

Whilst I was in Jordan we had a a Filipina working part time for the company who also freelanced as beauty therapist to the rich and famous..including a few of the royal palaces, she used to do my nails every so often and regale me with the gossip of the great and the good in Jordan - along with gossip the conversation was often more serious telling me about some of the lives of the Filipinas she had heard about kept in horrific conditions and being treated appallingly in Saudi, the Gulf States and in Jordan....the conversations always ended with her saying how grateful she was to be in charge of her own destiny in Jordan - she had her own residence permit (thanks to her palace connections) and basically worked where as she wanted to. Obviously she suffered similar issues to many of the Filipinos working overseas, she only comes back the Philippines once a year, her parents are bringing up her children. She doesn't lead a particularly glamorous lifestyle although she had her own car and lived alone with her dog - she also looked after Chairman Mao and Chiang Kai-shek for a few months for me whilst they were awaiting a quarantine place in Hong Kong!!


Although Jordan doesn't have accurate statistics to see what the real problem is, at least at this stage they are working to try to regulate the the treatment the average foreign worker receives.

Jordan is the first country in the Middle East to address the problem of domestic workers' rights, instituting the 2001 memorandum of understanding between the Ministry of Labour and UNIFEM that involves Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Nepal, India and Indonesia. In 2003, a standardised contract for foreign domestic workers stipulated a set salary and medical care. New laws followed to regulate and licence recruiting agencies. There is also a steering committee involving relevant ministries, embassies and NGOs.

However, reports of abuse still continue. Currently, there are 42 runaways at the Philippine embassy and 60 at the Sri Lankan embassy.

The Philippines has discovered that it's people (particularly the female population) are its greatest resource...this article makes for good background reading on Filipino overseas workers. However, until stricter regulations are enforced overseas it seems that the lot of an overseas Filipino is very uncertain...they could have a great employer who welcomes them almost as one of the family or they could be kept in near slavery... I think that a Filipina who go goes to work in the Middle East as a domestic helper is defintely taking part in a a very dicey game of chance, but given their situation at home thousands obviously think it is worth the risk.

Due to the Jordanian Times articles only being kept online for a week, the complete article is copied and pasted through the link below...

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The burden of proof: Foreign workers and abuse in the workplace

50 per cent of live-in immigrant workers abused by their employers — UNIFEM
By Sheila M. Dabu

Amman — It wasn't supposed to be this way.

Jennifer Perez, 23, recently graduated from a teachers' college in the Philippines, but she wanted to travel and work abroad. The dream became a nightmare less than a day after her arrival in Jordan. She is now quadriplegic.

The first official investigation as to how and why she fell from the second storey of the home where she worked as a domestic employee is under way. An argument with her employer three months ago resulted in what her “Madame” claims was a self-inflicted injury. Jennifer alleges it was attempted murder.

Like many of the estimated 40,000 to 50,000 foreign domestic workers in the Kingdom, Jennifer came to Jordan for a new opportunity and a better life.

However, some only find abusive employers or recruiting agents. The Philippine and Sri Lankan embassies in Jordan estimate that about 1 per cent of foreign domestic workers are abused.

According to a 2005 UNIFEM study, 50 per cent of live-in immigrant workers were being abused by their employers; 35 per cent study reported sexual abuse or harassment. UNIFEM admits that there is an absence of accurate statistics for immigrant workers in Jordan.

Ray Jureidini, sociology professor at the American University of Cairo, says that the number of domestic workers abused in the Middle East may be much higher than some estimates, which range from 1 to 10 per cent. But there are no official figures.

“I think it's invariably larger than the evidence that we have,” Jureidini told The Jordan Times in a telephone interview from Cairo.

One of the problems in collecting data, he says, is getting access to the workers for interviews. Most of his research includes anecdotal evidence.

Types of abuse

When abuse happens, the “Madame” or female employer is usually the perpetrator, according to Jureidini. Recruiting agents can be brutal, sometimes “bordering on torture,” he added.

Reported abuses by employers and agents include: Hitting, sexual harassment, “devirginisation,” psychological, emotional and verbal abuse, restrictions on freedom of movement, 16- to 17-hour workdays, and the withholding of passports and payment. Jureidini, an expert in the field of immigrant workers, says these conditions could be classified as “contract slavery.”

The US State Department considers this a form of human trafficking called “involuntary servitude.” According to its 2005 Trafficking in Persons report, Jordan is a “special case because full and accurate data on the extent and magnitude of its trafficking problem, which may be significant, is not available.”

While there is relatively little evidence of sexual abuse of domestic workers in Jordan, rape and sexual harassment have been widely reported in the Gulf, said Jureidini.

The business

Foreign domestic work is a booming business. Estimates of remittances by Filipinos last year are around $8.5 billion. For Sri Lanka in 2003, they were estimated at about $1.2 billion. But the financial windfall is felt not by the workers themselves but by the agencies and workers' home countries.

In 1999, there were 700,000 Sri Lankan domestic workers, mainly in the Gulf states, Lebanon and Jordan, according to Jureidini's UN Research Institute for Social Development report entitled “Xenophobia and Migrant Workers in the Middle East.”

An International Labour Organisation (ILO) Bahrain study found that wages are determined according to “the nationality of the female domestic workers instead of their experience.” This type of “market-driven discrimination,” says Jureidini, results in Filipinas being paid more than other workers because of their knowledge of English, lighter skin colour and physical features.

The average salary for Filipino, Sri Lankan and Indonesian domestic workers in Jordan ranges from $100 to $250 per month.

Culture clash?

Some argue that it is the “culture of shame” that prevents many Jordanians from working in blue-collar jobs. This mentality, some experts say, leads employers to look down on the workers because of their position of servility and possibly to abusive treatment.

Others claim it is cultural stereotyping that can lead to abuse.

According to Jureidini, market trends have resulted in the “racialisation” of certain occupations. “The dirty, dangerous and difficult jobs become associated with foreign (Asian and African) workers to such a degree that nationals in these countries refuse to undertake them, despite high levels of poverty and unemployment,” explains Jureidini. Foreign workers generally accept lower wages for these jobs as well.

Shatha Mahmoud, UNIFEM's Human Rights Programme coordinator says that domestic workers face multilevel discrimination.

“Firstly, it's because of her profession as `servant'... Secondly, she is a woman. Thirdly, they are coming from certain countries that are considered by some as the fifth or sixth world,” she said.

In addition to the cultural gap, language plays an important role, such as the worker not understanding the employer's instructions. The employer assumes that the worker is “stupid” when it is often a communication problem, said Jureidini, consequently reinforcing caricatures or stereotypes of certain ethnic groups.

The law

The main challenge of abuse cases is the burden of proof.

“They claim that they were maltreated, that they were slapped by the `Madame,' but of course that depends if the slap was hard enough to leave a mark,” says Philippine Embassy Welfare Counselor Evelyn Laranang. “But then again, it's still a slap. The problem is, if they're going to file a complaint, what will the police say?”

Jureidini reports that the fundamental problem is that there are no national or international laws that protect temporary foreign contract workers, most of whom are domestic workers.

Taleb Rifai, director of the ILO Regional Office for the Arab States in Lebanon, links the problem with the general plight of workers.

“The Middle East has the lowest rates of ratification of workers' rights all over the world,” he told The Jordan Times in a telephone interview from ILO headquarters in Geneva.

Although the region has been paying closer attention to human rights, there is still work to be done and as for Jordan's record, he says that the problem is not country-specific.

“Each country is a story by itself... Regardless of their differences, the Middle Eastern states are all in violation of international labour standards, starting with the very principle of sponsorship in which bringing a worker from one country to another is beginning to look more like ownership of the worker,” he said.

The ILO plans to conduct its first study in the Kingdom in 2006-2007.

Jordan: First steps

Jordan is the first country in the Middle East to address the problem of domestic workers' rights, instituting the 2001 memorandum of understanding between the Ministry of Labour and UNIFEM that involves Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Nepal, India and Indonesia. In 2003, a standardised contract for foreign domestic workers stipulated a set salary and medical care. New laws followed to regulate and licence recruiting agencies. There is also a steering committee involving relevant ministries, embassies and NGOs.

However, reports of abuse still continue. Currently, there are 42 runaways at the Philippine embassy and 60 at the Sri Lankan embassy.

“Although we have regulations, there are many difficulties when you go to implement them,” said Mahinda Samarasekeera, employment and welfare counselor of the Sri Lankan embassy.

There is nobody monitoring the enforcement of the contract, says UNIFEM'S Mahmoud, but discussions are under way in the steering committee. Other challenges are its widespread application and employers' awareness of the contract's existence, she adds.

The contract's major flaw, according to Jureidini, is that it infringes upon workers' freedom of movement. The sixth condition states that “the second party shall not leave the employer's residence or be absent from work without the employer's approval.”

Mahmoud admits that there is restriction of mobility but says that the provision seeks to protect the employer's rights. There may also be cases where domestic workers abuse employers, so there needs to be a balance of rights, she added.

“We might think of reformulating the article but to tell you the truth, we are really concerned about implementing the contract,” she said.

There are positive steps. The section in the Ministry of Labour responsible for foreign domestic workers is sending inspectors to investigate complaints and has closed down some agencies, said Etaf Halasseh, director of employment at the Ministry of Labour.

“Everything is ok,” Halasseh told The Jordan Times.

The courts punish those who violate the law, she added.

In 2004, the Jordanian government prosecuted several employers found guilty of abusing workers, closed down three agencies and provided assistance to trafficking victims, according to the 2005 US report.

As for Jennifer, she remains hospitalised and her case is pending in the court system.

“I asked why they treat us this way,” said Veronica, an abused Filipina runaway, “They told me that they have to discipline us. But I told them that we have a heart and a mind... We are human beings, not machines.”

Sunday, November 6, 2005.