Foreign Maids Face Dire Conditions in Singapore

When news anchor Zahara Abdul Lateef got furious with her 19-year-old Indonesian maid, she poured a jug of boiling water on her.

It burned Tutik Rinawati’s chest and back and landed Lateef in prison for two months earlier this year. Indonesians were outraged by the case, which highlighted the plight of female servants in this wealthy Southeast Asian city-state.

Women from across Asia flock to Singapore to escape poverty but often wind up overworked and with no personal freedom.

Employers are encouraged to keep maids’ passports so they can’t run away. Some maids get no days off and are prohibited from leaving their employers’ home.

Some women have been beaten and raped by employers. Some have fallen to their deaths while washing windows in high-rise apartments.

The phenomenon of falling maids has infuriated Indonesia, which in July temporarily banned its citizens from going to work in Singapore as laborers, saying more protections were needed for foreign workers. But the ban was not enforced and is no longer in place.

Hotma Panjaitan, a senior official at Indonesia’s directorate of overseas labor, said Indonesia has “been stepping up the monitoring to improve their conditions.” He did not elaborate.

Indonesian maids in Singapore have it much worse than their Filipino counterparts, who generally make better money because they speak English. Most Filipinos get Sunday off because their government brokered a deal with employment agencies in Singapore.

“I hate it here. But my family needs the money,” said Yanti, a 22-year-old maid who, like many Indonesians, uses only one name. Yanti sleeps on a mat in a pantry off her employer’s kitchen.

Employers can choose between single or married, Christian or Muslim, fat or thin. Maid agencies advertise prospects as “obedient.”

Although maid abuse is a punishable offense, maltreated maids often do not know where to turn for protection. Yanti and others said that given the chance, they would rather work in Hong Kong, where maids earn more and are guaranteed a day off.

Singapore employs about 140,000 foreign maids, about 80,000 from the Philippines and the rest from Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Thailand. For these countries, the money sent home is a welcome foreign currency boost.

Singapore profits too. Employers of maids pay a tax of $192 a month, which produces $330 million in annual revenue for the government.

Employers also must post a $2,750 bond, payable if a maid runs away or breaks the law. The bond is the main reason most employers keep maids’ passports and restrict their movements.

All foreign maids are required to take a pregnancy test every few months and are deported if the test is positive.

The fatal falls have sparked a debate in Singapore about how to protect maids.

“These workers are from different environments. Most of them stay in low-story houses in their home countries, but when they come here it’s 30 stories or higher,” said Huah Teng Lin, managing director of an employment agency in Singapore. “They need more training.”

Singapore’s Ministry of Manpower has started showing women coming to work as maids an orientation video with safety warnings.

The ministry has rejected proposals to punish employers if a maid gets hurt from falling. It says that although safety is the employer’s responsibility, such laws might not take into account special circumstances, such as suicides.

The Ministry of Manpower says 36 maids have suffered fatal falls since 1999--10 of them suicides.

Indonesia’s government puts the number of falling deaths at 43.

The treatment of maids led to strained relations with the Philippines in 1995 after Singapore hanged a Filipino maid for murder despite Manila’s appeals.

Anti-Singapore protests broke out in the Philippines, and both countries withdrew their ambassadors for about a year. The Philippine Embassy in Singapore has since brokered deals with maid agencies requiring maids to get at least one day off a week.

Maids earn an average of 330 Singapore dollars ($165) a month--a pittance by local standards, but far more than they could make at home.

Why do women put up with a maid’s hard work far from home?

“It’s the money,” said a Filipino maid who identified herself as Jacki. “Our kids will be educated with this money.”