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Abuse cases show lack of government protection
A recent abuse case that saw a domestic worker allegedly locked in a restroom for five days and starved to death in North Jakarta highlighted the perennial issue of lack of protection for such workers
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span>A recent abuse case that saw a domestic worker allegedly locked in a restroom for five days and starved to death in North Jakarta highlighted the perennial issue of lack of protection for such workers.
The 20-year-old domestic worker, identified as LN, had reportedly endured abuse while working for TVL over four years in Muara Karang.
North Jakarta Police chief Sr. Comr. Budhi Herdi Susianto said the 51-year-old TVL would abuse LN if the latter failed to complete her tasks.
“If she failed to iron clothes up to the employer’s standard, the suspect would attack her using an iron and even a pestle,” Budhi said, adding that LN was never allowed to visit her hometown in all the years she worked for TVL.
Last week, LN was accused of stealing food and money, and as a punishment, the employer reportedly locked her inside a bathroom without food for five days.
LN was found dead on Monday. “The victim was thin and covered in bruises, new and old ones,” Budhi said on Tuesday as reported by kompas.com.
TVL took LN’s body to Atma Jaya funeral home, where the management became suspicious of the bruises.
The funeral home management then reported the case to the police.
TVL is detained at the Penjaringan Police station and will be charged under Law No. 23/2004 on domestic violence eradication, which carries a maximum sentence of 15 years’ imprisonment.
However, during a press conference at the North Jakarta Police station on Tuesday, TVL said LN tried to harm herself by jumping off a ladder, hitting herself with a pestle, sleeping in the bathroom and refusing to eat.
TVL claimed no problems had emerged in the four years LN had been employed, however the latter had recently expressed her desire to visit her hometown.
“She had asked to go back to her hometown, but when asked, sometimes she would say that her home is in Garut [West Java], and then another time said that it was in Bandung [West Java],” TVL told Penjaringan Police.
She claimed that the bathroom where LN was found could not be locked from outside.
The case has served as a reminder that while efforts have been made to protect Indonesian migrant workers, there is a lack of protection for domestic workers.
The abuse rate of domestic workers is high in Greater Jakarta, where around 60 percent of 428 cases took place this year, according to the National Network for Domestic Workers Advocacy (Jala PRT).
Lita Anggraini of Jala PRT said the government had failed domestic workers by not passing a draft law on domestic workers and not ratifying the International Labor Organization Convention No. 189 on domestic workers.
With few protections provided by the government for domestic workers such as LN, employers could rule by whim.
Jala PRT had also urged the House of Representatives to pass the law on domestic workers since 2004, she said.
“[LN’s] case shows the poor working and living conditions of domestic workers, which had led to them still being discriminated against as there were no protections [for their job],” Lita told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.
The government issued Manpower Ministerial Regulation No. 2/2015 on domestic workers protection in 2015.
“But it is not binding and is more of an appeal, and it aims to regulate domestic worker outsourcers,” Lita said.
Approximately 428 cases of abuse against domestic workers were recorded by Jala PRT in Medan, North Sumatra; Lampung; Greater Jakarta; Semarang, Central Java; Yogyakarta; and Surabaya last year.
By April, 221 cases had been reported to the organization.
