Maid Abuse in Malaysia

Maid mistreat is no semipermanent a new issue in Malaysia. What is amah deprave? It is known as an assault and domineering behaviour, which mainly includes physical, psychological and at times familiar too, by employer or signboard withstand members of employer against a psyche hired as a home(prenominal) help. Malaysia is wizard of wealthiest countries in South East Asia and in that locationfore acts as magnet for migrants fleeing here to organise. In Malaysia, majority of the domestic workers be full time workers and most of them set out from neighbouring poor countries. in that respect argon various factors that occur to amahservant squall in Malaysia.The unfortunate affair is that wetnurse abuse does not only produce two mental and physical injuries to the maids, but it in all in all(prenominal) case jeopardize our international friendship with countries problematic. Hence, there is an imperative need to solve this social issue. One of the major ca uses of maid abuse over here in Malaysia is the lack of comprehensive national policies for maid certificate by our Malayan Government. As pointed out by DCruz (2009), foreign domestic workers here be vulnerable as they lack of legal protection, which subjects them to any kind of working condition an employer sees fit.There is likewise no specific law in Malaysia on violence against domestic workers (wao. com. my). As stated by Lourdes (2008), maids ar stuck in a Catch -22 topographic point because the second they seek for help from the authorities, their employers or agents get out lodge identifys against them. The Employment Act provides them the right to indemnify but the Immigration Acts removes it by making them illegals living here. consort to Dass (2008) in Lourdes (2008), the employers forget be sensible by the agents that maids who misbe wealthy person would be given management but this counselling turns up to be fill up with punishing and abusing.Maids are existence told that if they repeat their mis guards, they bear be sold into prostitution. Other than that, they are slapped and beat out in beaten in front of others so that the tolerate provideing feel threatened. In addition, the maids precise own attitude too, contributed to the more(prenominal) cases of maid abuse. They are not serious in their work and as an example, according to Ho, his maid washed one pailful of the familys clothes and hid the other behind the house under a shed below the mango tree tree. There are maids who also tend to take advantage of their employers by stealing things and using gouge without permission.Based on Hos statement, some(prenominal) of his familys belonging including his underwear build been stolen by his maid before. This is just a real keep example of what whitethorn lead to why employers jactitate out all their temper by abusing the maids. The inglorious mindsets and attitudes towards maids too, contribute to maid abuse. M any Malayans have negative perceptions of migrant domestic workers which contributes to the frequency and severity of abuse. They are often viewed as culturally inferior, sometimes little than compassionate, and not considered as deserving of the akin respect and consideration given to other human beings (wao. com. my).Adiwara stated that Malaysians have the tendency to look voltaic pile on Indonesians because of the economic gap amongst the dickens neighbouring countries. Employers misjudge the performance of the maids and scold them unnecessarily and this whitethorn be due to some shortcomings in the employers themselves. There are certain employers who are concerned that there might be a rift between the child and parent when the children are culturally influenced by the maids (wao. com. my). Another party that should be put to deuced for is the involvement of non-professional maid recruitment services, or more generally known as the maid agencies. fit in to Wong (2008) in Azizan (2009), a lot of money allow for be charged by the maid agencies and in order to meet the market demand, a a couple of(prenominal) of the agencies will hunt for girls from the village, get them cleaned up and will send them right away to their respective clients without any training. This issue of untrained maids is supported by the Malaysian Association of Foreign Mai Agencies (PAPA) president Alwi Bavutty as he admits that PAPA is hold responsible for the maids. byout so many years, there are quite a number of negative effects that are being identified which are caused from maid abuse and many the great unwashed are reatly affected by all these consequences.One of the major negative effects and is usually published in local newspapers are that the victims house both mentally and physically from maid abuse. As stated by DCruz (2009), the types of physical abuse are they are beaten, raped or hagridden with hot boiling water. To make matters worse, there are several maid abuse cases where babies are born(p) from the result of rape. Besides that, nearly all maid abuse victims have been treated like slaves. According to DCruz (2009), they are given only unadorned rice, several occasions with non-halal provender even for those who are Muslims.Lourdes (2008) too, states that permanent working hour, termination goods, sick leave, rest twenty-four hour periods, public holi mean solar days, overtime and every other benefit that a normal employee is entitled to are not provided to them. To further add on, as mentioned by DCruz (2009), the victims are not paid wages for months or even years of tiring work. All of the above clearly violates basic human rights and the employers need to be taken into action legally. Negative effect is also present during the legal process to claim their rights as it is mentally damaging for the victims as stated by DCruz (2009).It is hard for them to avoid depression as they are forced to put their lives on hold whil e reliving the trauma of the abusive days. Referring to dry land Times (2009), the economy and lifestyle of the confederacy will be disturbed due to maid abuse. For example, Malaysia maid agencies are predicted to suffer massive losses due to Indonesians indefinite ban on sending maids over. This will somehow affect the productiveness of Malaysias economy since because a large aggregate of domestic help comes from Indonesia.Apart from that, lifestyle of the community will be disturbed as tens of thousands of sign would face difficulties due to the delay in the reaching of their maids and this would lead to a larger obstacle in the long run as families will have a hard time coping with work and family without any extra hands. Subsequently, relationship between countries involved will be jeopardized. As emphasized by The Star (2009), In Malaysia, when maid abuse became a hot topic among both Indonesians and Malaysians, it resulted in causation Indonesia taking a serious action o f impenetrable to temporarily stop sending heir people to work in Malaysia.This has caused the political relationship between Indonesia and Malaysia to become awkward and it took a lot of trend to restore the friendship between the two countries. The maid abuse cases which were made known internationally have indirectly portray Malaysia as a brutish country. Every problem has its own resolution and this goes to maid abuse too. This problem can be curbed through with(predicate) the roles of government and community. Both have to perform their roles in order to cut through this issue. The government can trucking rig issues related to the interest and welfare of maids.For instance, the government may to resort into measures like conducting random checks on homes. Through this, the early signs of mistreatment can be detected which will prevent this issue from getting worse. Referring to Boo (2010), there are no simple solutions in solvent the issue of maid abuse. The solutions in the end lead to the importance of education and enforcement. An agency responsible in managing the welfare of maids should be set up as a channel for the maids to know who to contact and how to report against their bosses who abuse their rights. However, education on their rights needs to be supplied to the maids first.Cooperation between Malaysian government and related countries such(prenominal) as Indonesia government is important in control this problem. As stated by Malaysian endorse (2010), there are several cases involving the abuse of Indonesian maids had been solved through the close cooperation between Malaysian and Indonesian officer It shows that this issue can be solves peacefully as long as both countries are willing to cooperate. Based on Malaysian Digest, (2010), our government and Indonesian government has taken a smart action by signed a Letter of Intent on the sending of Indonesian maids to Malaysia.This letter requires Malaysian employers to give one day off i n a week to their Indonesian workers and their passports be kept by the workers themselves unless agreed upon by both sides that the passport be kept by the employers which occurs in certain cases. This had prevented misunderstanding between the maids and the employers regarding the maids day off and passport matters. As suggested by Hariani Azizan (2009), some other solution to this problem is through the roles of community. There are quite a number of ways on how the community can help the government to overcome this issue.For example, authorities can organize a hebdomadal meeting among its community and invite the officers who are experts in the field of the maids rights to speak to the maids as well as provide check-ups and counselling for the maids without attack peoples privacy. Another alternative solution is to actually build encourage homes for the maid abuse victims. According to Malaysian Digest (2010), Rumah Kita, a shelter home that was launched to provide temporary accommodation and food for Indonesian female migrant workers who are go about with difficulties such as being cheated by affair agencies or abused by their employers.It is more effectual when everyone in their respective neighbourhood take on the role of looking out for any abuse in their community and report them to the authorities. To conclude, there is an pressing need for maid abuse to be curbed as it brings negative impacts to many parties, especially to Malaysia as a whole. Therefore, everyone including the maid themselves must come together as a unit and cooperate to demolish this issue.