Filipinos back home after ‘abuses’ in Malaysian detention

Four Filipino children and their mothers detained in Malaysia last month for allegedly violating immigration laws arrived back in Manila this week thanks to help from church and migrant groups.

Malaysian authorities released the children earlier this week after immigration agents took them away from their migrant worker mothers following a series of raids last month.It was not clear what immigration laws the migrant workers violated.

The children arrived back in Manila on July 3 after spending two weeks in detention at Bukit Jalil Immigration Detention Center in Kuala Lumpur.

The children were gripped by exhaustion while their mothers found themselves going frantic at being separated from their children, according to Migrante International.

The group claimed that the children’s belongings were also taken by immigration officers.

“Our rights as humans were violated,” the children’s parents said in a statement upon arrival in Manila.

Migrante International and the ecumenical group Churches Witnessing With Migrants facilitated the repatriation of the Filipinos back to Manila.

Ralyn (not her real name), one of the detained women, said they were fed “stale and burnt food fit for pigs” during their detention.

“The female wardens … were vile and mean and treated us like animals,” added Ralyn.

She said the children, who were not spared from verbal abuse, were traumatized by the experience.

Other detainee claimed that they were not allowed to use sleeping mats and instead were told to sleep on the ground.

“We wore the same clothes that we had been wearing on the night we were arrested,” said Enny, another of the returnees.

She said, however, that despite her bad experience she would still go abroad to work because there are “no decent-paying jobs” in the Philippines.

The migrants said almost all the detainees in the immigration center came from Myanmar, Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Kenya, and Nigeria. 

In its statement, Migrante International underscored the need for regular and stable employment at home for Filipinos to address the problem of migration.

Earlier this week, a Philippine Catholic bishop called for an investigation into “loan sharks” back in Manila who reportedly hold the passports of Filipino migrant workers as collateral for loans.

Bishop Ruperto Santos, head of the Episcopal Commission for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People, made the call following reports that authorities in Hong Kong recovered 1,400 Philippine passports from a lending company.

“To hold [passports] as collateral is blackmailing people for a very excessive interest rate,” said Bishop Santos.

“It is a very sad story, where, with the precarious and dire needs of our [migrant workers], they become victims of heartless and unscrupulous persons,” said the prelate.More than two million Filipino workers leave the country every year for employment abroad, according to Migrante International.