I was forced to clean the walls of a 5-storey building – Ghanaian maid recounts ordeal in Saudi Arabia

A young lady, Yaa Baby Oparebea Asare, who left the shores of Ghana for greener pastures has narrated the traumatising moments she served as a housemaid in Saudi Arabia.

She said upon receiving her documents after contacting a Madina agency which was introduced to her by a friend, she left Ghana due to financial difficulties and family problems.

She said, she and her colleagues who were travelling for the same purpose were not allowed to take their phones along as the agent assured them, their sponsors would provide them with phones when they got to their destinations.

She noted that following their arrival at the airport in Saudi Arabia, they were picked up and packed in a van when they were taken to the agent’s house.

She disclosed that any attempts to open the curtains in the van was responded with a slap.

“From the airport, they came with a van and packed us like sardines. We were more than twenty in a small van. When they are taking you to the agent’s house, you are not supposed to look outside, they have curtains in the van. If you make an attempt to open it, you’ll receive a slap,” she said in an interview with Joynews.

In narrating her ordeal after she was picked from their agent’s house by their sponsors, she said she was taken to a family who lived in a 5-storey building where she cleaned, cooked and maintained the house.

She adds that she was sometimes denied food.

“The building was a 5-storey building and you are going to work alone. Immediately you enter the room, they will tell you to rest and after an hour or two, they will call you to get to work. They will give you food and that will be all you’ll have for the rest of the day. Sometimes, you won’t get the food at all.”

She narrated that she was maltreated by the family to the extent of washing the walls of the 5 storey-building after she was falsely accused by her boss’ sister-in-law.

She further stated that she was mostly locked up inside her room, adding that she was recaptured in her first attempt to escape.

“When my boss was going out, they locked me inside the room. When they went out, I opened the door and passed through the backdoor and went outside. I was standing outside and didn’t know where to go. They saw me and locked me in the garage,” she said.

She, however, managed to escape on her second attempt but was arrested by the police after being caught by her boss in the presence of the police. She said she struggled with her boss before escaping.

“So, he was driving outside and what I have to do is when the garage door was coming down, I just threw myself down and rolled out of the garage”.

She said her sponsors were, however, arrested after she narrated her ordeal to the police.

She was subsequently rescued through an initiative by the Ghanaian government through Ghana’s ambassador to Egypt, Dr. Winfred Nii Okai, the Lebanon community in Ghana and other well-meaning organisations.