Maids, Slaves, and Prisoners: To be employed in a Saudi home

Joel Mowbray

One night in 1998, "Saida," a young Filipina, was carried bloody and unconscious into a hospital emergency room. The Saudi man who took her there was not a Good Samaritan; he was her rapist. He was also a good friend of the Saudi couple who employed her as a domestic servant. When her employers learned of the rape, they rushed to the hospital-not to help her, but to whisk her out before she could incriminate their friend. They took her back into their abusive custody, where she was to see the rapist again.

This horror story took place not in Saudi Arabia, but in northern Virginia. Saida was relatively fortunate, in that her ordeal happened in the U.S.: When she escaped a year later, there were places where she could take refuge-something that would have been virtually impossible in Saudi Arabia. But Saida is not the only woman to be trapped and abused in a Saudi household in America. NR has spoken with a dozen such women (or, in three of the cases, their friends or attorneys), and all agree that their situations were not isolated incidents. Saudi culture, the women explain, includes dominance and abuse-and that "lifestyle" is brought to the U.S. in Saudis' baggage.

A hypothetical, but typical, tale: A woman from Indonesia comes to Saudi Arabia with the promise of $800 a month-to her, a veritable fortune-to care for several children. When she arrives, she is forced to surrender her passport to her Saudi employers-a practice protected by Saudi law-and she is immediately told that she will be responsible for cooking and cleaning as well. She earns only $200 per month, if she receives any money at all. When she gets to the house, she is forced to work 16-or more-hours a day, and her employers occasionally beat her. When there is no work left to do at this house, she is passed off like mere property to the employers' friends and relatives. Through either psychological abuse-such as being told that she will be arrested if she escapes-or being literally locked in, she is rendered unable to flee to freedom. The U.S. State Department knows that this forced servitude of women takes place in the homes of Saudis even on American soil-and yet refuses to take measures to combat it.

Tens of thousands of women are abused in Saudi Arabia each year. According to the Saudi government, some 19,000 domestic servants-almost exclusively foreign women working in Saudi Arabia as maids-escaped from Saudi homes in the twelve months prior to March 2001; the real figure is likely far higher, because the government statistic counts only those women who go to government-run shelters for "runaway" domestics. But even aside from the fact that women new to the country probably don't know the whereabouts of these shelters, the options presented to the women at the shelters are not particularly attractive. As a Saudi official explains, "The ministry provides them with food and shelter until their cases are settled by either returning them to sponsors or deporting them to their home country." In other words, the trip to the shelter results in either a return to the abusive employer, or swift deportation without receiving back pay.

More than 8 million of Saudi Arabia's 21 million residents are foreign nationals who work in largely menial or blue-collar positions. About 1 million work as domestics, such as gardeners and maids. The vast majority of the 400,000 maids are women from Asia, with most of them hailing from extremely poor countries. Women who have slim job prospects at home respond to agency-placed ads promising relatively large salaries to work in Saudi Arabia. Even though Saudi abuse of domestics is well known in these poorer countries, the women still go to the Gulf nation because-explains the Heritage Foundation's Paolo Pasicolan-"the income disparity is so huge that many women believe it is worth the risk."

Saudi Arabia abolished slavery in 1962, but it treats domestic servants in much the same way fugitive-slave laws treated blacks in pre-Civil War America. Saudi newspapers run bounty ads announcing the "escape" of domestics and requesting the help of fellow Saudis in the return of this "property." Women who do not find their way to government-run shelters-themselves viewed by human-rights experts as largely a PR ploy-face a harsh fate. Notes Amnesty International's Brian Evans: "Women who go to the police station seeking help actually get locked in jail until their employers come and pick them up."

There is a loose-knit underground railroad that helps domestics flee abusive employers. According to women who have worked in Saudi Arabia, parallel structures operate within each ethnic community, meaning Filipinos help Filipinos, Indonesians help Indonesians, and so on. Those in the best position to provide assistance are drivers, who are the best-treated domestic workers and obviously have access to transportation. Women who worked in the kingdom say that one common escape route is to hide in the trunk of a car while being driven to a safe house or directly to a port city, such as Jeddah, where they can leave the country by boat. The Saudi press-which is largely controlled by the royal family-worries about the high rate of escape among domestic workers. One commentator, Abu Adel, wrote in the English- language daily Arab News that the solution is more stringent law enforcement: "The police and security departments need to give greater attention to the network of escaping maids."

News of this abuse occasionally erupts in the American press-usually when Saudis bring it to the West. Last summer, King Fahd's niece, Buniah al-Saud, pled guilty to a single misdemeanor charge for pushing her Indonesian maid down a flight of stairs in her Orlando home. The princess escaped with a slap on the wrist because the victim, who had gone back to Indonesia to attend her mother's funeral, was denied a visa by the State Department to return as a witness in the trial. What did not receive much press attention, however, was the second count of the indictment: involuntary servitude. That charge was dropped as part of the plea bargain.

Three members of the Saudi royal family, including a sister of King Fahd, were caught up in a scandal five years ago in London for their treatment of three Filipina women. The women sued the Saudi royals, alleging that they had been physically abused, starved, and held against their will in the Saudis' mansion in London. The Filipinas said they were often locked in the attic, were fed mere scraps of food, and were denied medical attention when they became gravely ill.

Stories like this one-and like that of "Saida," above-are far too common among Saudis in the U.S. Although every individual situation has its unique aspects, most situations involving domestics working for Saudis have seven hallmarks: confiscation of passports, contract terms unilaterally changed, overlong working hours, denial of medical attention, verbal and often physical abuse, a prison-like atmosphere, and-in the cases of the women able to speak with NR-dramatic escapes. All of the women with whom we spoke worked in the U.S., although some first worked inside Saudi Arabia; the women who worked in both countries said their conditions did not improve once in the U.S. Three of the stories are particularly compelling-and sadly representative. (Because the women fear reprisal from politically connected Saudis, NR is respecting their wish to be identified by aliases.)

When she stepped off the airplane in Saudi Arabia, the very first thing Maryam, a Filipina Muslim, did was surrender her passport to her new employers. Even before she reached their residence, she was told that she was going to receive only $150 of the $600 per month agreed to in the contract. Work at the mansion-her employer was a dignitary who often had famous guests, including Muhammad Ali-lasted from dawn until late in the evening, with the only "time off" a brief period each Sunday. If she finished work ahead of schedule, she was "lent" to the employers' friends and relatives. Although she was not physically or sexually abused-she believes she was spared because she is a Muslim- Maryam was repeatedly scolded and denied the ability to contact her family back in the Philippines. After two years-when the contract had officially expired-Maryam wanted to return home, but because of the dramatically reduced pay, she didn't have the money to do so. She demanded that the employers pay for her travel back-something they were contractually obligated to do-but the only option they gave her was to go to with their son's family to the U.S. She accepted, believing that working in America would be better. It wasn't.

At her new employers' home in a college town in Illinois-the husband and wife were both college students-Maryam was denied a bed and forced to sleep on the hard floor. Because she could read and speak English, her new employers would hide newspapers from her to keep her ignorant of the outside world. She was still forbidden to contact her family, and was prohibited from talking on or even answering the telephone. Just as in Saudi Arabia, she was passed off to the employers' friends, leaving her precious little time for sleep. She was lucky; an associate of her employer who came into contact with Maryam would eventually help her escape.

Like Maryam, Fatima was a Filipina Muslim. She, too, answered an agency ad to work in Saudi Arabia. She signed on to be an English tutor; but when she arrived, she reports, "I was turned into the maid and butler, as well." She soon came to regret her decision: At one point she had a serious ear infection, with a 104[degrees] fever. Her employers would not take her to the hospital or even allow her to see a doctor-they insisted, rather, that she clean their very large and elegant bathroom. To this day, Fatima has chronic migraines and ear infections as a result of not receiving treatment.

When Fatima worked for Saudis in the U.S.-a diplomat's family in northern Virginia-the doors were locked inside-out and outside-in, making it impossible for her to exit the house. When she demanded her back pay at the end of the contract term-she was paid only $200 of the contracted $800 per month, and hadn't been paid at all in the previous three months-the female Saudi employer accused her of stealing. To "prove" that Fatima was a thief, the woman had her strip naked, place the palms of her hands against the wall, and spread her feet apart. The Saudi woman proceeded invasively to search Fatima's body. After that, Fatima decided to escape; but it would take several attempts over three months before she proved successful.

When the four children for whom she was responsible had Saudi playmates over, Fatima "interviewed" the other children. Over the course of the afternoon, Fatima learned three vital pieces of information: 1) that their nanny was a Filipina; 2) their mother's work schedule; and 3) their home phone number. After Fatima eventually managed to swipe a key-allowing the employers to blame a four-year-old Saudi child with a penchant for picking up and moving or hiding random objects, including keys-she called the Filipina nanny. They agreed to meet at a Metro station in suburban Maryland. The woman agreed to wait for Fatima for one hour-a deadline Fatima barely met, since a Saudi friend of her employer had given chase to the cab that was Fatima's "escape vehicle."

A third woman-Kaswanti, a Muslim from Indonesia-has a similar story. She also toiled in a Saudi diplomat's D.C.-area home-and was literally worked so continuously that she was never afforded time to bathe or change into clean clothes. (She was, in fact, not "allowed" to do either.) During her one horrifying month in the U.S., Kaswanti lived in total fear: If she was caught eating or sleeping-both of which were prohibited-she was beaten. When she did eat, it was snacking on scraps when no one was looking.

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.

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.
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