Slapped till her tooth falls out

The New Paper
Sunday, Aug 21, 2011

SHE had never been beaten and had never known hunger...until she went to work in Malaysia in April.

In the six weeks that Ms Hok Pov worked as a maid for a Malaysian family, she said she lost 10kg while toiling 20 hours a day with little to eat. She alleged she was also slapped and punched by her employer.

"I was so hungry I even ate chicken bones," said the sobbing 31-year-old Cambodian at the Kuala Lumpur office of Malaysian rights' group Tenaganita, which rescued her in June with the help of police.

She is among 41 Cambodian maids rescued this year by the group, highlighting the abuse and exploitation of foreign domestic workers due to inadequate laws in the country.

"There was always a lot of work to do and I had to suffer beatings. Once I was slapped so hard that my tooth fell off. Who can bear this?" she said.

Ms Hok Pov, who said her hair was cropped like a boy's, was promised a monthly salary of RM650 ($260) - double her wage as a factory worker in Cambodia. But she claimed she hasn't received any money from her employer.

"I just want to get my salary and get out of here. I don't ever want to come to Malaysia again," said Ms Hok Pov, who is married and has an 8-year-old son.

"They are rich, educated people, but why don't they have any compassion for the poor like me? I have no one to turn to. Every night, I cried myself to sleep. It was 1½ months in hell."

Tenaganita official Liva Sreedhana said it was difficult to file criminal charges against Ms Hok Pov's employer as she has no physical injury or scars to show.

The group is now negotiating with the employer, who is refusing to give Ms Hok Pov any money and is dodging meetings.

Ms Men Chaveasna, who lives in Tenaganita's shelter with Ms Hok Pov, completed her 2-year work contract last August but has yet to receive her wages.

Her Malaysian employer bought her a flight home and allegedly ditched her at the airport. Ms Chaveasna, 30, won a case in the labour court this year to demand wages totalling RM7,700 owed to her. But her employer appealed to the high court and the case is pending.

She, too, has decided to stay home.

"There are many new factories in Cambodia and I can find jobs," she said.

Concerns of abuse of Cambodian maids came under the public spotlight after a Cambodian maid was found dead last month outside her employer's home while another was rescued by Malaysian police after she was allegedly abused and had her head shaved bald by her employer.

According to the embassies of Indonesia and Cambodia - which have supplied the bulk of more than 230,000 foreign maids in Malaysia - about 2,000 women come forward every year with complaints of abuse.

A string of high-profile abuse cases, including deaths, led Indonesia to ban its women in 2009 from working in Malaysia.

Some 50,000 of the foreign maids in Malaysia are Cambodians, of which 30,000 came this year alone. Cambodian Ambassador Norodom Arunrasmy said yesterday that Malaysia is the only country that recruits Cambodian maids, giving the poor a lifeline.

She added that the Cambodian government is in the process of drafting a new law to protect its maids, including screening the employers.

"To ban or not to ban would be up to my government but they (the government) also know that our people need work and jobs in order to survive," she said.