ANMag Issue 13 Public Surveillance
Story behind Doors
By Farah Salka, Staff Writer
Saint Julians, Malta - In one of the Lebanese newspapers, on the last line ever of one of the middle pages, to the right, in a barely decipherable font (and I am positive they had no intention of the reader noticing it), a couple of words that sum up to merely one sentence were jotted: “Ethiopian commits suicide using her shoe laces.”
Very interesting information we have got here. Let us see. Hela Madehni, barely 27 years of age, has decided to end her life, in any feasible, doable way. Why would anyone commit suicide, tying her shoelaces between her neck and the bathroom window? Good question. No answer. You actually think the Lebanese government is going to take the time to investigate such a mundane case? You actually assume the Lebanese press is going to take a break from the forever ongoing political turmoil to turn to something worthy of looking into for once? Come on. Those people have priorities. The maid was only Ethiopian, so who really cares? Maybe her husband and son who are waiting for her back in Ethiopia do. But then again, they do not count. No investigation will ever be done, her death is going to be disregarded (as has been the case with the dozens of Syrian workers murder), and whatever her employees have done to lead her to this shall be ignored.
This is a typical example of how shamefully ugly the unveiled face of Lebanon actually looks. This country, whose citizens always happen to claim themselves “civilized” and superior to all (as in all), is the same place where racism fills the air (Let me put blatant sectarianism aside for the moment). We live in a country where people label their maids by their nationalities, as if they are imported nameless. We live in a country where people are so blinded by this extreme grandiose obsession that they do not acknowledge how xenophobic they act towards Palestinians, Syrians, Sri-Lankans, Arabs and the list just goes on and on… We live in a country where people perceive they have the right to judge you merely because you have a different dialect. In a country where being a maid means you are enslaved (it is healthy to call actions by their names sometimes) and “right-less,” your passport is confiscated the minute you step on this soil; you are dragged to participate in demonstrations with your old employer and hold her political party’s flag for her while she calls for freedom for her country when she gave you no freedom to chose if you want to participate in this march or not (does the poor maid even know what the colorful flag she is holding stands for?!). We live in a country where foreigners are priced according to their skin color; the darker, the cheaper. In a country where an ambassador’s wife was not allowed into a private beach once because, “No maids are allowed.” Firstly, she was no maid at all. Secondly, is “no maids allowed” equated with “no smoking here” and “no dogs allowed” in this country? This country where slavery lives on in new modern forms. We live in what they claim to be a civilized country, most civilized of all...Precisely!
If this suicidal case was an exceptionally−happening one or an isolated incident, I might attribute its causes to several possible scenarios of which the employers are innocent. However, what people ought to understand is that this case is part and parcel of a long pattern of Lebanese “fineness” in creative abuse of maids. It is not only about the late Ethiopian maid. It is about the Sri-Lankan one. It is about the Phillipino one. It is about the Bangladeshi one. It is about all those who passed away before her, whether by jumping out of the balconies or hanging themselves in the most unimaginable settings.
It is about all those who will follow them.
It is about the investigations that will never be done to tackle the truths of their deaths.