By Media Mindanao News Service
News Digest Volume 1, August 1987-July 1988
Posted by Davao Today
ILIGAN CITY (MMNS/ October 15, 1987) – Five Muslim associations in Mindanao have appealed to both Philippine and Saudi governments for justice for a Filipino overseas worker recently reported to have been abused by her Arab employer.
In a statement received by MMNS October 7, the Five Muslim alliances condemned “in the strongest possible terms” Mr. Abdulasis Basher Al-Fajid, who was reported in a national daily (Inquirer, 2 Oct.) to have maltreated Filipina Muslim Ms. Reheemah Ebrahim, his domestic helper until she was dismissed last month.
“We condemn in the strongest possible terms, Mr. Abdulasis Al-Fajid, for his evil, inhuman insulting and cruel deeds towards our sister, a Muslim Filipina, Miss Reheemah Ebrahim of Dinaig, Maguindanao,” declared the Islamic Brotherhood and the Balik Islam Society of Southern Philippines. The other signatories were the Shuban’nel Muslimeen Tableegh Al-Alam, the King Faisal College Student Association and the Muslim Alliance of the Philippines (MAP), the last said to have membership from Manila, Visayas and Mindanao.
The Muslim groups also denounced the maltreatment of all Filipino overseas workers who in many cases have been duped by their fellow Filipinas in the recruitment agencies.
17-year old Ms. Ebrahim, a Maguindanao Muslim who was orphaned at a tender age, was reported to have arrived in the country 1 October after a three-month servitude in Saudi Arabia.
A photograph in the same daily showed her being treated at the Manila International Airport clinic for wounds inflicted by her former master. “She arrived in the country with her legs swollen and her back hearing bluish lessions, all signs of cruelty and torture she suffered at the hands of her Arabian employer,” the newspaper reported.
The Muslim groups, threatening to go the streets to press their demands, appealed to government agencies in the country to investigate the firm which recruited the Muslim woman. They also appealed to the probe of other cases involving the exploitation of Filipino overseas workers.
The five Muslim groups also seek redness To His Excellency, King Fahd of Saudi Arabia, for the Filipina victim, appealing to him to apply strict Arabian laws on the perpetrators. (Media Mindanao News Service News Digest Volume 1, August 1987-July 1988 Posted by Davao Today)
