ABU DHABI // A Filipino migrant rights group is calling on refuges to stop forcing women to hand over their mobile phones and valuables.
Since November, Migrante-Middle East has received at least five complaints, including two from runaway maids in Abu Dhabi who were unhappy at having to hand over their possessions.
The maids were staying at the Filipino Workers Resources Centres, shelters run by Philippine government labour and welfare officials.
They had fled their employers after complaining of long working hours, lack of sleep, unpaid salaries and mistreatment.
John Leonard Monterona, the regional co-ordinator for Migrante-Middle East, said officials should not confiscate "distressed overseas Filipino workers' belongings".
"The mobile phone is their only means of communication," Mr Monterona said. "Confiscating their phones violates their basic rights as an individual and as a migrant worker."
Mr Monterona said that last week he received a complaint from a Filipina maid in Oman who sought refuge at a centre in Muscat.
When he called the centre's caretaker he was told that making residents hand over their valuables was standard procedure, for "security" reasons.
"That's not enough justification," Mr Monterona said. "What happens if there's an emergency or they would like to inform their family about their situation?"
But Nasser Munder, the Philippine labour attache in Abu Dhabi, said mobile phones were misused.
"Some enter into illicit relationships and escape from the shelter," Mr Munder said. "They have been using their phones to send text messages to their boyfriends who fetch them."
He recalled an incident last year when a maid escaped and returned to the Filipino Workers Resource Centre traumatised. She is now back in the Philippines.
"She ended up in a park and met a man who smiled at her," Mr Munder said. "She went with him and they had sex. She had nowhere else to go and decided to return to the centre but another man who offered her a lift had sex with her."
He said maids needed to understand that the centre was not a dormitory or a "haven for prostitution".
"It's a halfway home for distressed workers," Mr Munder said. "We're trying to protect them."
He said that last year, a maid had escaped four times from the shelter but officials still admitted her.
"She got an STD and we referred her to a Filipino doctor for treatment," Mr Munder said.
He insisted that the labour office let occupants have their phones for two days a week, then took them back for safekeeping.
But Mr Monterona said some women resorted to hiding phones in their underwear when they arrived at the shelter, then used them in the toilets.
"We can't do anything if they want to hide their phones," Mr Munder admitted.
Staff also keep hold of maids' cash and jewellery.
Mr Munder said one maid who decided to keep her belongings later complained that Dh1,100 and her phone had gone missing. Another maid's new phone was stolen when she left it charging while she went to the toilet.
At the shelter in Dubai, the labour attache said he had no problems with the same policy.
"This is a standard policy of all Filipino Workers Resources Centres worldwide," said Amilbahar Amilasan. "In Dubai, when a worker needs to speak to her family, the centre co-ordinator allows her use a standby phone at our expense."
The aim, Mr Amilasan said, was to stop "boyfriend cases" at the shelter. The women were asked to sign a document stating their belongings had been taken for safekeeping.
"They understand and are co-operating," said Mr Amilasan. "I have yet to hear or receive a single complaint from a ward or a relative."
rruiz@thenational.ae