5,000 angry people took to the streets on Sunday to seek justice for Erwiana, who suffered serious injuries allegedly at the hands of her employer. Shouting slogans and holding up signs proclaiming “Agency=bloodsuckers” and “End modern day slavery,” they marched along Hennessy Road from Wanchai to the Central Government Complex to protest.
According to Apple Daily reporters in Central Java, Erwiana is still healing from her injuries but is starting to practice writing with a pen in anticipation of the Hong Kong police’s arrival today for her testimony. Her hands and feet have rotted from infection and she has been unable to eat herself, relying on her mother to feed her. She vowed that she will return to Hong Kong to press charges. Representatives of Erwiana Sulistyaningsih have even urged her to sue the government, who, according to law, has the duty to protect people from “cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.”
Erwiana said that she almost could not remember her last 48 hours in Hong Kong — she only recalled that she was passing out in the toilet due to being forced to work on three hours of sleep a day. The employer, Lo, had sent her home because her teenage children, 16 and 14, had complained. Despite seeking help from the recruitment agency, Chan’s Asia, during the ordeal, Erwiana said that she was pressured to keep working to pay back fees of HK$18,000.
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Source: Apple Daily, SCMP
Photo: Justice for Erwiana Justice for Migrant Domestic Workers Facebook
