Rapunzel update number six

Center for Philippine Journalism has a report on maid abuse and the jumping Filipina maids...
Flores is one of around 20 Filipinas in Lebanon so far who have taken a leap — literally. Like Jezebel Guillermo, a 31-year-old domestic helper from Isabela, Flores is grateful she survived her fall. But at least one other worker has not been as lucky; in another case, it's not clear whether the worker jumped or was deliberately pushed to her death. Five others are feared to have gone mad.

Flores and Guillermo's decision to jump came largely from fear of being war casualties. Yet according to nongovernment organizations, Filipino workers in Lebanon have been jumping off buildings even before the recent war broke out.

In 2004, six Filipinos working in Lebanese households died under "mysterious" circumstances after falling from buildings — "mysterious" because while their employers claim the workers committed suicide, their fellow workers say some of them may have been thrown off the buildings by their employers. Apart from the Filipinos, 47 Sri Lankan workers are also reported to have committed suicides in 1997 alone.

Helen Dabu, who is with the Kanlungan Center Foundation, an organization that has dealt directly with victims of abuse from Lebanon and elsewhere, says the women jump off buildings out of despair. In 2000 alone, the last year a database was compiled by the Lebanese Pastoral Committee for Afro-Asian Migrant Workers, there were over 400 reported cases of physical and sexual abuse against migrant workers, half of the victims Filipinas.

Filipino workers suffer from abuse all over the world. But while it is difficult to accurately say whether Filipinos are better off or worse off in Lebanon than in other OFW destinations, Dabu says that the Middle East (including Lebanon) is the region from where they receive the most number of complaints about abusive employers. Such cases outnumber those reported in Hong Kong, Singapore, or Malaysia where the complaints involve more contract violations rather than rape or maltreatment. Dabu's assessment is supported by Philippine labor attaché to Lebanon Ma. Glenda Manalo, who says this is also the view of many other diplomats working in the region.
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