Filipino domestic sentenced 5 years for manslaughter

Filipino domestic sentenced 5 years for manslaughter

Montreal–Members of Filipino community organizations from the National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada (NAPWC), PINAY (Filipino Women’s Organization in Quebec), Kabataang Montreal (Filipino Youth Organization), and SIKLAB-Montreal (Filipino Migrant Workers’ Organization) were present Wednesday (Oct. 26) during the sentence hearing to show support to Melanie Baysa, a domestic worker who entered through Canada’s Live-In Caregiver Program (LCP), and her family when she was sentenced to five years in jail for manslaughter. A representative of the Philippine Consulate General was also present during the hearing, but left shortly after the sentence was given.

“We sympathize with the family’s tragic loss of their baby” states Cecilia Diocson, Chairperson of the National Alliance of Philippine Women in Canada (NAPWC). Diocson continues, “On the other hand, the judge failed to look at the LCP as the context where individuals lose their dignity and also a cause of alienation in our society.”

The worsening social, economic, and political conditions of the Philippines pushes over 3,000 Filipinos out of the Philippines every day in search of livelihood. The systematic exportation of Filipinos is facilitated by the Philippine’s Labour Export Program (LEP) is the economic program of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s government who declared that one million Filipinos will be sent abroad. This government banks on migrant worker remittances to prop the ailing Philippine economy through their $8 billion USD sent to the country every year. It is within this context that Melanie Baysa was forced to leave her family and loved ones to work as a modern-day slave in Canada in order to survive.

For over twenty years, the Filipino community brought forward hundreds of stories of abuse, hardship, and strain under the anti-woman, racist LCP to both the Philippine and Canadian governments. In 2003, the Philippine Women Centre of B.C. reported the suicide attempt of a domestic worker in Vancouver who crippled under the emotional duress of family separation and her grueling employment situation. Last February, SIKLAB – B.C. rescued a domestic worker from an employer, who worked 17 hour days and received the equivalent of 59 cents an hour with no overtime or holiday pay. Also, she was only granted one day off in her two months of work.

Data from Citizenship Immigration Canada reveals that 95.1% of women under the LCP are Filipino.
“Filipino women fulfill a need for cheap labour in this country by taking the most dirty, difficult, and dangerous work that Canadians do not want to do” explains Diocson.

As progressive women in Canada who desire genuine equality and human rights for all, we should support the call to scrap this exploitative and oppressive program.

(PRESS RELEASE)