Antislavery Usable Past

GH

2013 (Narrative Date)

There are an estimated 10,000 people living in modern slavery in Hong Kong (GSI 2018). Approximately 370,000 foreign domestic workers, primarily from Indonesia and the Philippines, work in Hong Kong; some become victims of forced labour in the private homes in which they are employed. An NGO report released in 2016 estimated as many as one in six foreign domestic workers is a victim of labour exploitation. Employment agencies often charge job placement fees in excess of legal limits, and sometimes withhold identity documents, which may lead to situations of debt bondage of workers in Hong Kong. The accumulated debts sometimes amount to a significant portion of the worker’s first year salary. Some employers or employment agencies illegally withhold passports, employment contracts, or other possessions until the debt is paid. Some workers are required to work up to 17 hours per day, experience verbal, sexual or physical abuse in the home, and/or are not granted a legally required weekly day off.

GH, a 29-year-old woman from Cilacap, Indonesia was trafficked to Hong Kong for domestic work.

When I arrived at the training centre in Surabaya, I had to get my hair cut short like a boy. No trainee could leave the centre without depositing more than IDR 1 million [US$100] or a property certificate with the broker’s guarantee. The recruitment agency owner also kept our mobile phone. We could only call our family once a week. Aside from the training, we had to do housework – like laundry and cleaning – for the owner and staff, as well as baby-sit their children. We had very little to eat. Once the owner told all the trainees that he was purposely feeding us very little food so that we could get used to life as a migrant domestic worker in Hong Kong, as we would surely be underfed by our employers.

I had to give the recruitment agency my junior school diploma, family certificate, husband’s permission, marriage certificate and Indonesian ID card. After the seven- month deduction period in Hong Kong, my family was allowed to retrieve them from the agency.

The placement agency took my passport and contract when I arrived in Hong Kong. After seven months, the agency returned the documents when I had finished paying back my recruitment fees. But then my employer confiscated them.

Narrative provided by Amnesty International

Country

Theme

Domestic slavery

Tags

VOICES: Narratives by Survivors of Modern Slavery

This is the world's largest archive of modern slavery survivor narratives. Across more than a million words spoken or written by survivors of modern slavery, we can see why slavery persists in particular hotspots, analyse patterns in trafficking routes, identify vulnerabilities, understand more about the challenges survivors face in liberation, and discover new antislavery solutions. These narratives offer the chance to systematically design new antislavery strategies based on the experiences, ideas and solutions of enslaved people themselves.

The database is searchable by country, name, theme, and narrative date. Narratives can be viewed in list or map form. A short introduction provides context to each narrative. Narrative provenance appears after the main narrative text.

For ideas on how to use this database, please see our accompanying guide.

Project Lead: Zoe Trodd. Team Members: Andrea Nicholson, Lauren Eglen, Rosemary Pearce, Olivia Wright.

Project Funders: AHRC Antislavery Usable Past grant (2014-19), ESRC/AHRC PaCCS Modern Slavery: Meaning and Measurement grant (2016-19), and AHRC-GCRF Antislavery Knowledge Network grant (2017-2021).

For any queries about the collection please contact: [email protected]. If you wish to cite a particular narrative, please acknowledge the survivor’s name, the provenance of the narrative and cite: Voices Database, the Rights Lab, University of Nottingham.

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