Stamping out Brazil’s domestic slavery an uphill battle
Loading player...
Rio de Janeiro — Whenever Elisa goes out in her small town in northeastern Brazil, she fears seeing the family she once considered her own.
After almost three decades of domestic work with no pay and little freedom, Elisa realised she was a slave and plotted to escape the household where she had lived since the age of seven.
The 38-year-old was rescued in 2018 after alerting the authorities and has started to build a new life. But a reminder of her captivity, fear and exploitation is never too far away.
“Every now and then I see the family,” she said by phone from her home in Ipira town in Bahia state. The family told officials they took Elisa in as a child after she was abandoned by her parents when they separated.
“It is kind of a horrible, difficult feeling,” added Elisa, who did not give her real name for fear of reprisals. “There’s a sense of fear, even though they can’t do anything to me.”
Elisa’s rescue was a rare victory for labour officials, who said domestic servitude in Brazil is difficult to identify and stop because victims rarely see themselves as modern-day slaves.
While labour inspectors can visit workplaces at will to check for slavery, they must obtain permission from a judge to enter a home and said evidence of abuse from victims was a prerequisite.
Of 3,513 workers found in slavery-like conditions by officials from 2017 to 2019, only 21 were in domestic servitude.
“It is very rare to receive complaints [about domestic servitude] ... as most [victims] never realise they are being abused,” said labour prosecutor Ana Lucia Stumpf Gonzalez.
And advocates fear the coronavirus pandemic will see more domestic workers trapped with abusive employers indefinitely yet unlikely to speak out or seek help for fear of losing their job.
Even when victims are rescued and their captors prosecuted or fined, officials said relatively low compensation payments for domestic servitude and the rarity of jail terms for modern slavery meant exploitive bosses were unlikely to be deterred.
Yet domestic servitude hit the headlines in Brazil in June when authorities found a 61-year-old domestic worker who they judged to have been kept as a slave in a mansion in Sao Paulo for years.
The case shocked the public — she was found living in a shed, and her boss worked for Avon. The beauty company fired ...
After almost three decades of domestic work with no pay and little freedom, Elisa realised she was a slave and plotted to escape the household where she had lived since the age of seven.
The 38-year-old was rescued in 2018 after alerting the authorities and has started to build a new life. But a reminder of her captivity, fear and exploitation is never too far away.
“Every now and then I see the family,” she said by phone from her home in Ipira town in Bahia state. The family told officials they took Elisa in as a child after she was abandoned by her parents when they separated.
“It is kind of a horrible, difficult feeling,” added Elisa, who did not give her real name for fear of reprisals. “There’s a sense of fear, even though they can’t do anything to me.”
Elisa’s rescue was a rare victory for labour officials, who said domestic servitude in Brazil is difficult to identify and stop because victims rarely see themselves as modern-day slaves.
While labour inspectors can visit workplaces at will to check for slavery, they must obtain permission from a judge to enter a home and said evidence of abuse from victims was a prerequisite.
Of 3,513 workers found in slavery-like conditions by officials from 2017 to 2019, only 21 were in domestic servitude.
“It is very rare to receive complaints [about domestic servitude] ... as most [victims] never realise they are being abused,” said labour prosecutor Ana Lucia Stumpf Gonzalez.
And advocates fear the coronavirus pandemic will see more domestic workers trapped with abusive employers indefinitely yet unlikely to speak out or seek help for fear of losing their job.
Even when victims are rescued and their captors prosecuted or fined, officials said relatively low compensation payments for domestic servitude and the rarity of jail terms for modern slavery meant exploitive bosses were unlikely to be deterred.
Yet domestic servitude hit the headlines in Brazil in June when authorities found a 61-year-old domestic worker who they judged to have been kept as a slave in a mansion in Sao Paulo for years.
The case shocked the public — she was found living in a shed, and her boss worked for Avon. The beauty company fired ...