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Maids, Slaves, and Prisoners: To be employed in a Saudi home
National Review, Feb 24, 2003 by Joel Mowbray
Kaswanti, too, decided to escape. Beaten, starved, and sleep-deprived, she made her way to a neighboring apartment building. She curled up in a hallway, shivering, until someone found and rescued her.
The Saudi culture of abuse is well known to officials at the U.S. State Department. Diplomatic Security (DS), State's law-enforcement arm, has received "many" calls from police stations over the years about Saudi diplomats abusing domestic workers, says a DS officer who spoke on condition of anonymity. Human-rights activists have also worked tirelessly to make State fully aware of the problem-but to little effect. "'We' don't want to anger those who are politically connected, such as the Saudis, so the State Department chooses not to provide oversight . . . It's appalling," says human-rights attorney Jean Bruggeman.
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Activists familiar with the abuse of domestics say that there are many simple measures that could considerably improve the current state of affairs. The easiest reform would be for State to do something it currently does not: make domestic workers fully aware of their rights- in their native language-before they receive visas. Consular officers should inform women that no employer has the right to seize passports, and that changing contract terms to pay less than minimum wage is illegal. Women should also be counseled about how to seek help if they are abused, and told that going to the authorities does not necessarily result in deportation. Something that would be more involved-and more expensive-would be to have a monitoring system like the one that is currently in place for au pairs, whose employers are subject to random, monthly check-ins. Such a step would not be a panacea-abuse is often well hidden-but it would be a dramatic improvement.
The silver lining, as far as many human-rights activists are concerned, is that the Department of Justice has demonstrated a willingness to fight the abuse of domestic workers. "The DOJ has been very supportive on the cases where we've worked with them," notes attorney Lisa Johnson-Firth, who has helped many domestic and migrant workers who have fled servitude. DOJ's number-three official, Viet Dinh, has taken a personal interest in the issue, according to associates.
All of the women with whom NR spoke have recovered remarkably well, considering what they have been through. Most are still experiencing the after-effects of trauma, but almost all of them are engaged or married, and all feel blessed to live in the United States. Amazingly, when asked if she would do it all over again, Maryam echoes the sentiments expressed by the other women: "I would do it again, because I am in America. This is freedom. I am living in freedom."
COPYRIGHT 2003 National Review, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning
