RI maid was 'forced to live in cage'

RI maid was 'forced to live in cage'

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP): An Indonesian maid was forced to live in a caged area in the backyard of her Malaysian employer's home for 30 months and was not paid for seven years, reports said Tuesday.

Ruminah Atem, 57, of East Java, was testifying in court Monday against her employer and his wife.

They are charged with confining her for 946 days at their home in Bangsar, a wealthy suburb of Kuala Lumpur.

Ruminah, quoted by newspapers and the official Bernama news agency, said she was confined in a grilled cubicle without toilet facilities and had to use an ice cream container as a toilet. She said she was be let out for only one hour a day to mop the floor.

Ruminah also said she was not paid from 1991 to 1998 and given no holiday. Asked why she did not try to run away, she was quoted by the Star as telling the court: "Where am I going to find food, where to sleep? I am illiterate."

She was rescued when police came to the house in 1998 to investigate reports of ill-treatment.

There has been a spate of reported abuses of Indonesian maids in recent months. Several employers are facing court action.

Earlier this month a maid said her employers beat her with a broomstick because a mosquito had bitten their baby.

In another case an Indonesian maid said her boss "branded" her hand with a burning incense stick after accusing her of theft.

One Indonesian maid was admitted to a hospital intensive care unit after her female employer allegedly hit her on the head with a rock.

The trial of Aminah's employers is continuing.

There are 162,868 foreign maids in the country, mostly from neighboring Indonesia, Thailand and Cambodia.