By Feizal Samath
AMMAN, May 27 2004 (IPS)

Like any other domestic worker, Kanthi (not her real name) sends money home regularly to her family in Sri Lanka. But she leads a double life – she has a boyfriend and they have a child here in the Jordanian capital.

While stories of abuses and risks that Sri Lankan domestic workers face are often reported on, those about the situation of women migrant workers who stay overseas for years and have second families there are not.

”These are secret lives that they lead. They have a family here and a family in Sri Lanka. Husbands, children and families back home in Sri Lanka are totally unaware of the double life spouses or mothers are leading here,” said one Sri Lanka worker, who declined to be named.

Many of these migrant workers are part-timers, according to labourers IPS spoke to here.

The talk here is that nearly half of some 40,000 Sri Lankan domestic workers are part-timers who have run away from the homes of their sponsors – forced by constant harassment or encouraged by friends to seek freedom, independence and a chance to make more money.

Indeed, part-time women domestic workers, working for about two to three hours a day per household, earn more than than live-in domestic workers.

But while they do gain new freedom and more money by working half outside the legal system, this also snares them in a trap. Because they work on either temporary or false work permits, their return to Sri Lanka – even for a holiday – is restricted.

Some are likely to remain in Jordan for years, veteran workers and non-government workers believe. Stuck here, some get into prostitution to supplement their income.

Because their lives are now oriented toward staying on for some length of time -meaning that going home to Sri Lanka is not easy or not always possible – it is not unusual for these workers to settle in, and develop new relationships in Jordan.

Often, many of the women workers’ partners are male workers also from South Asia, such as Pakistanis or Bangladeshis.

Accounts told to IPS say that some however find it a struggle to surive and may end up living in dingy tenement houses and spend year after year in the country.

While reports of migrant women workers returning home pregnant or with babies out of wedlock are not new, the situation in Jordan of women living with their boyfriends and having children, as well as working as independent domestic workers is a new phenomenon, sociologists in Sri Lanka say.

”This is a new development and a serious one,” noted Anthony Weeramuda, associate professor of sociology at the University of Colombo. ”The social disruption of homes as a result of women migrating to the Middle East on work would further be aggravated.”

”This is a shocking new development,” said Dr Nimalka Fernando, a respected rights activist who covers migrant worker issues. ”We have had cases of Sri Lankan women being raped or being forced into prostitution as migrant workers, but this situation of women having two families (by choice) is very worrying.”

In fact, the subject is reviving a debate over whether women should be banned, as they are in India, Pakistan or periodically from Bangladesh, from working overseas as unskilled workers, such as domestic help.

Weeramuda, who works on migrant issues, believes it is necessary to revisit the need for such a ban.

Sri Lankan governments have rejected previous calls for a ban – not because they support the view that this would be a violation of the fundamental right to travel, but because workers’ remittances of one billon dollars a year are the largest source of foreign exchange.

More than a million Sri Lankans, of whom more than 70 percent are female domestic workers, are employed abroad.

But other experts believe the root of the problem goes much deeper, to the social dislocation and costs on families and society brought about by the large numbers of women going overseas for work.

For instance, ”We appeal to the Sri Lankan government not to permit women with infants to take up overseas jobs,” noted Sister Ursula, a German Catholic nun who works with Caritas, a church-funded non-government organisation.

Added the nun: ”These women come here and cry for their babies. They are very homesick. It’s a pathetic sight. Also young girls should not be sent. It ruins their young life forever.”

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