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Eight Months a Slave


I’ve been meaning to see the movie 12 Years a Slave. For the past few days though, I’ve been a witness to the unfolding of Erwiana’s life story that could be aptly titled “Eight Months a Slave”. Erwiana’s story can make even the most hard of hearts bleed–physically assaulted for eight months for any perceived […]

I’ve been meaning to see the movie 12 Years a Slave. For the past few days though, I’ve been a witness to the unfolding of Erwiana’s life story that could be aptly titled “Eight Months a Slave”.

Erwiana’s story can make even the most hard of hearts bleed–physically assaulted for eight months for any perceived mistake, verbally abused, allowed to sleep only for four hours each day from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m., provided only with bread or a cup of rice as meal for the whole day, given a mere bottle of boiled water, and not allowed any dayoff or holiday for the whole period of her employment.

Really, her employer should be punished as severely as the law would allow for the hell she put Erwiana through.

But behind the pictures of the healed, half-healed and fresh bruises and wounds; behind the photos of her clear suffering from her head-to-foot injuries; and behind the stark contrast of her smiling cheerful face before she started her employment and the almost unrecognizable photos of her that went viral on Facebook, lies more abusers who must also be made responsible for Erwiana’s plight.

There’s her recruitment agency that chose greed for profit over protection of her person. After her first month, she tried to run away but her agency took her back to her employer while telling her that she could not leave her employer before completing her payments to the agency.

Then there is also the Hong Kong Police Force who, on the day that Erwiana was brought to the airport, received a report for a possible abuse case but put it under the “Miscellaneous” category that greatly diminished the urgency and gravity of the report.

Lastly, there are the states that force and keep domestic workers in a condition of slavery.

We have the sending states like Indonesia in the Philippines with their policies allowing recruitment agencies to charge monstrous fees that put migrant workers trapped in debt and under the mercy of recruitment and placement agencies. The almost absent structures and mechanisms of on-site support for their people who encounter problems abroad is also a great deterrent to anyone with complaints.

Then there is the Hong Kong government that is so delusional in thinking that its policies on migrant domestic workers are the best in the world. What’s so great about the mandatory live-in arrangement that forces MDWs to a condition of being on-call 24 hours a day and forces them to accept any arrangement inside the confines of the employer’s house? What’s so admirable with the Two-Week Rule that puts migrants in a lose-lose condition of choosing between joblessness and enduring abusive treatment? What’s so perfect with HK’s policies that actually promote discrimination and social exclusion?

Somehow, I’ll go and finally see 12 Years a Slave. For now, I’ll settle with seeing that justice is accorded to Erwiana, and that the decades old slavery of MDWs and all migrant workers is ended.