Imprisoned and beaten: Second helper tells of escape from violent Hong Kong employer
Hong Kong woman arrested but not charged after Filipino helper said she was imprisoned and beaten from the day she arrived in city
Another domestic helper has come forward claiming she was verbally and physically abused by her female employer for nine months.
Following the alleged abuse case of Indonesian helper Erwiana Sulistyaningsih, Filipino Rowena Uychiat claimed today she was imprisoned at her employer’s home in Yau Yat Tseun, Kowloon Tong, from the day she arrived in Hong Kong on July 22 last year and eventually escaped to seek refuge in the Mission for Migrant Workers shelter.
At a press conference today, organised by the Justice for Erwiana and All Migrant Domestic Workers Committee, she said: “I was shouted at, called stupid and abused verbally.” Wiping tears from her face, the 37-year-old widow said she was constantly beaten with a wooden stick, slapped, kicked and had her hair pulled.
Uychiat, who has previously worked as a helper in Kuwait, claimed all her documents were taken from her and she wasn’t even allowed to leave the house to collect her Hong Kong identification card or send payment balance to her recruitment agency in the Philippines. She also said the agency had illegally charged her HK$9,100.
After months of abuse, the mother of two children said she finally called a relative for help when her employer was on holiday last month, and was referred to the Mission for Migrant Workers at St John’s Cathedral in Central, who took her in.