Jailed Taiwan domestic needs freedom fund

A foreign domestic worker (FDW) in Taiwan is seriously in need of assistance from migrant organizations and advocates. Helen Carumba, a 49-year old foreign domestic worker (FDW) with three children has been sentenced by prosecutors to 10 months of imprisonment. Earlier, she was arrested and detained by Taiwan’s National Immigration Administration (NIA) for falsification of her own travel documents.

Prior to this, Ms. Carumba had already been detained for four (4) months, a highly irregular circumstance since Taiwanese law mandates that illegal migrants should immediately be deported, and that the NIA can only detain migrants for the mere purpose of deportation (unless the prosecutor officially requests for longer detention. In Helen’s case, there was no such request from the prosecutor.

Migrants’ C189 advocacy bears fruit

(Source: APMM News Digest, July 2012)

“Finally, months of campaigning and lobbying by migrant organizations have paid off, and the C189 can now be used as a benchmark for protecting the rights of all dometic workers, especially those working abroad.”

This was the reaction of Ramon Bultron, Managing Director of the Asia Pacific Mission for Migrants (APMM), on the Philippine Senate’s recent ratification of the ILO Convention on Domestic Work (C189). Voting overwhelmingly for the Convention last August 6, the Upper House passed Senate Resolution No. 816, or the Resolution Concurring in the Ratification of Convention 189, Convention Concerning Decent Work for Domestic Workers. This was approved on third reading with 20 votes, zero negative vote and zero abstention.