Most of female workers of Middle East are residing in Lebanon where there are about 60 thousand domestic helps out of two lakh Bangladeshi female workers.
According to a survey conducted by ‘Kafa’ and ‘Legal Agenda’ on the Bangladeshi and Nepalese female workers it is understood that 82 percent female workers are to work against their will.
About 62 percent workers are to work 16 hours to 20 hours everyday. Salaries of 54 percent are kept held for one month or more. Some 90 percent workers are not allowed to go outside alone. Ninety one percent female workers are deprived of weekly recess.
From the survey it is observed that fifty percent workers are forced to work by locking them from outside. 19 percent sleep in the kitchen, seven percent in the balcony and many are forced to sleep in the bathrooms.
No good food is given to 32 percent helps. Ten percent domestic helps are victims of serious sexual tortures. In that survey sexual tortures on the Bangladeshi women were highlighted.
The desert of Lebanon is being soaked by the tears of our own kith and kins, Bangladeshi women. The air of Lebanon is heavy with their wailing.
The pertinent question now arises whether our Expatriate Welfare Ministry is at all aware of the situation or sincere about their welfare. In the past this failure of the concerned Ministry was discussed at many levels but no result was seen.
Lack of coordination between Foreign Ministry and Expatriate Ministry was discussed much earlier. But who will alert those ministries. Lebanon was earlier dealt from Jordon but now a full fledged embassy was set up in Lebanon last year.
It is hard to believe that the man who is posted at the embassy whose wife was accused of torturing domestic help while in Sweden. That incident put Bangladesh in image crisis last year. Dignity of country was lowered down in Stockholm.
Present Bangladesh ambassador to Lebanon Gawsul Azam Sarcar was ambassador posted to Swedish capital Stockholm who also covered the other Scandinavian countries of Norway, Denmark, Finland and Iceland. At that time many raised about his competency over discharging his responsibilities there.
It is learnt that he was very close to the then foreign minister that helped Gawsul to get the coveted posting.
Before evaluating his competency as the ambassador to Stockholm the unforeseen incident of torturing house maid occurred. In the posh area of Stockholm, ambassador’s wife Sadia Azam used to inflict physical torture regularly on maid Tayeba.
Tayeba was brought from Dhaka for domestic work. Being tired of physical torture Tayeba one day managed to come out of the ambassador’s residence and went to Swedish police. The administration became alert. The news reached Swedish foreign ministry.
After probing the maid -torture incident by Swedish police, the incident proved to be a fact and according to Swedish law the ambassador’s wife Sadia Azam was asked to leave Sweden. After some time Bangladesh government also withdrew Gawsul Azam from Sweden and posted him to Beirut. This was the unfortunate reality. A hard tragedy!
The man who failed to protect his own domestic help from his wife’s torture how he will protect our millions Bangladeshi domestic help? Some diplomatic circles in an oblique reference told that a man like Gawsul Azam Sarcar most likely will not be able stop the tears of Bangladeshi maids in Lebanon who are victimized to inhuman tortures.
BDST: 1625 HRS, MAY 21, 2014
