Female victims slam minister for labelling some complaints false

Victims and their families have denounced Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment Minister Nurul Islam's claim last month that some torture complaints filed by female migrants against Saudi employers were false, many by homesick ones intending to return home.

By overlooking the fact that allegations of harassment and exploitation by employers and brokers are frequently arising, the government is making them more vulnerable at workplaces, they said.

The Riyadh and Jeddah diplomatic missions see a couple of workers on an average coming in every week, some with harassment complaints and others seeking shelter, they added.

On July 18, the minister said in parliament that another complaint issue was over being provided bread and other food instead of rice.

He told The Daily Star on July 21 that the number of abuse incidents was “very small” and such incidents occurred in Bangladesh. “Whenever we receive any specific complaint, we ask our officials to take action immediately,” he claimed.

Bangladesh Ambassador Golam Moshi said there were some torture incidents and some complaints resulted from failure to adapt to the new environment.

Between April 2015 and June this year, over 60,000 female workers went to Saudi Arabia for domestic jobs, says the Bureau of Manpower Employment and Training.

BMET and embassy sources say at least 1,500 females filed complaints during this period accusing employers and brokers of beating, cheating and exploitation.

Returning to Bangladesh in June, Parveen Begum, 25, of Bhola, said to have got no solution informing her local manpower recruiting agency of physical and mental torture after fleeing her employer's residence in April and taking refuge at the Riyadh embassy.

She said she got one-month's pay though she worked for five months in October 2015.

She said sexual harassment and rape by employers did occur as she knew some who fell victim and heard about others. “If we have to face torture and harassment, why we will stay there,” said Parveen who has a small daughter.

Returning in April, another worker Lovely Akhter said brokers had prevented her from filing a complaint with police there accusing her employer of beating her.

“Some employers do not even feel any guilt sexually harassing female workers every day,” she added.

Going through some of the applications submitted at BMET by families seeking initiatives to bring back working members, this correspondent found most of the complaint to be over torture, misbehaviour and sickness.

One such application of April 25 was by one Nur Nabi Hasan stating that his wife Rina Begum was suffering from a mental disorder for the last five months on being tortured by her employer.

“They were not even providing her proper treatment,” he said, adding that Rina was unable to return as her employer and broker had threatened that her wage would not be paid.

Counsellor Sarwar Alam at the Riyadh embassy admitted that there were some incidents of abuse, mostly over misbehaviour, workload and food.

“After getting verbal complaints...we advise them to file cases, which the majority usually decline,” he told this correspondent over the phone on July 20.

Jasiya Khatoon, director of Warbe Development Foundation, which works for migrant workers' welfare, said female workers usually faced harassments as they had to stay in their employers' houses. “Our government must mount pressure on the Saudi government to arrange separate accommodations and thus complaints will come down,” she added.

Sarwar said though the Riyadh embassy's shelter house was meant to provide accommodation to 30 to 40 persons, some 90 to 100 females were now staying there.

He said they requested the ministry to provide a solution as the number of female workers and victims was gradually increasing.