Refleksi : Mugkin sekali diantara TKW Indonesia ada juga yang dipekerjakan sebagai gembala kambing disamping bekerja sebagai PRT.
http://arabnews.com/saudiarabia/article262314.ece Maid turned shepherdess rescued from sponsor By MD RASOOLDEEN | ARAB NEWS Published: Feb 14, 2011 23:45 Updated: Feb 14, 2011 23:45 RIYADH: Sri Lankan Embassy officials rescued Monday a housemaid who was hospitalized for one month while working as a shepherdess in a remote desert in the central part of the Kingdom. Fathima Azeera, 43, had come to the Kingdom to work in a Saudi household in Hail on Sept. 20 last year. Instead, the sponsor assigned her to look after his animal farm instead. "Two weeks after I went to the Saudi house in Hail, my 'Baba' (sponsor) told me that in addition to regular household chores, I have to look after his livestock farm near the house," Azeera told Arab News, adding that there were more than 100 animals in the farm including sheep and cows. "I had to do it all by myself and also sleep in a tiny hut in the farm at nights without a heater." According to Azeera, she had to go to the farm at 5 a.m., unload the animal feed from the vehicle, feed the animals, clean the yard, milk the cows and sheep and return to the house by 10 a.m. every day. "Then, I have to cook for the family members and attend to all the other household chores, including washing clothes, cleaning the house and looking after the children," the woman said, adding that it was impossible for her to work in such a way. "I was coughing out blood because of infections from the animals." The maid who has been in Hail government hospital for the past 30 days, said that even medics and paramedics admitted that her illness was due to laborious work in open areas during the tough winter. "My right hand and leg had become numb because I was handling cold water and was working in freezing weather in an open area in the farm." Sri Lankan Embassy Labor Welfare Officer Sunil Wijesinghe, who visited Azeera with his translator Mohammed Nagoorthamby Uwais, said the embassy had responded to a complaint that the maid had been missing from the house for more than a month. According to him, although the majority of local sponsors look after their maids in a satisfactory manner, there was a fraction that treated them terribly. "This was a case where the maid has been entrusted to do a shepherd's job, which is against the labor contract," he added. Wijesinghe said he had exerted great efforts to secure Azeera's release from the hospital, since the sponsor was not willing to part with her. "The sponsor demanded SR11,000 from us, claiming he had spent so much to bring the woman from Sri Lanka, including visa fees, agent's charges and air fare. "The maid's health condition was not satisfactory, however. We brought her to Riyadh so she would be directly under the embassy's supervision while she receives medical treatment from a local hospital." The embassy official said the mission receives around 10 runaway housemaids per day. Common complaints from domestic workers include nonpayment of salaries, ill-treatment and being overworked. Recently, the Colombo government announced that it was in the process of working out a new mechanism to reduce the number of such cases by ensuring the list of duties were explicitly stipulated in employment contracts. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Post message: [email protected] Subscribe : [email protected] Unsubscribe : [email protected] List owner : [email protected] Homepage : http://proletar.8m.com/Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/proletar/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/proletar/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: [email protected] [email protected] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [email protected] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
