On Wednesday (January 1), the Kuwaiti police arrested the wife of a Kuwaiti public officer on charges of beating her Filipina housemaid to death.
The alleged murder came nearly a year after Philippine Rodrigo Duterte enforced a (temporary) ban on hiring new household workers from his country in Kuwait following the discovery of a frozen body of a Filipina housemaid in an apartment in the capital Kuwait City.
Death of Filipina Maid in Kuwait Linked to Possible Torture – DFA
Around the same time a year ago, the discovery of the body of a Filipina housemaid in an abandoned apartment in Kuwait marred relations between the two countries before they reached a new agreement providing for the protection of Philippine domestic workers.
As per local Kuwait newspapers, the police arrested the Kuwaiti woman and her husband, who works as an officer at the criminal investigation department at the Interior Ministry.
Investigators, however, believe that the officer is not involved in the Filipina’s death and that his wife had tortured and beaten her up many times over the past months. Forensic examination showed that the maid, born in 1993, had bruises and signs of beating and torture all over her body.
Furthermore, doctors informed the investigators that the Filipina had been tortured periodically over the past months by the officer’s wife.
Because of this discovery, the police arrested the woman and her husband for interrogation. Following this, the police reported that the husband is not involved in the maid’s death.
Meanwhile, Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr on Tuesday (Dec 31) demanded justice to be served for the Filipina maid who was allegedly murdered by her employer’s wife in Kuwait.
In the same manner, the Philippine Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) also slammed the death of Jeanelyn Padernal Villavende according to a report by the Kuwait Times.
During a meeting with Kuwait’s Ambassador to Manila Musaed Saleh Ahmad Al-Thwaikh, Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro “Teddy” Locsin noted: “The friendship between your country which gives our people the jobs they cannot find at home and our people whose faithful service makes the life of your people easier depends on justice being done the murdered maid. An eye for an eye, a life for a life.”
For his part, Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III noted that the Philippine government is offended over the killing. “The labor department is deeply saddened and outraged over the violent death of Filipino worker Jeanelyn Padernal Villavende at the hands of her Kuwaiti employer,” he said in a statement. “The case is a clear violation of the agreement signed by both Kuwait and the Philippines in 2018 that seeks to uphold and promote the protection of the rights and welfare of our workers in the Gulf state,” the DOLE chief clarified.
Despite airing grievances as expected, Bello also urged for the immediate resolution of the death of the household service worker and assured that assistance will be provided to the family of the Filipino worker.
Here is a video clip on this report shared by GMA News/YouTube:
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