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Spared Death, Former Overseas Maid Reunites With Family After Six Years
Ronna Nirmala | December 29, 2011

Bayanah hugs her father, Banhawi, and son, Andri, upon her arrival at Soekarno-Hatta Airport. She had been sentenced to death in Saudi Arabia. JG Photo/Safir Makki Bayanah hugs her father, Banhawi, and son, Andri, upon her arrival at Soekarno-Hatta Airport. She had been sentenced to death in Saudi Arabia. JG Photo/Safir Makki
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londoedan
6:50pm Dec 29, 2011

I am happy for Bayanah and her family. Hard to imagine what she experienced for the past 6 years in a Saudi Jail not knowing her fate and (probably) no contact with her family. I wish you all the best brave woman.

And to Didi: What is so sophisticated with Saudi Arabia - they live in about 700 years in the past. Also many Saudi families are NOT as rich and as sophisticated as you might think. In fact according to the Gulf News, 30% of Saudi nationals are living in Poverty!!

DrDez
5:02pm Dec 29, 2011

Didi - Amnesty International produce figures I can't be certain but I think from memory we were about 7th place on totals with death sentences at home and either 2nd or 3rd in the abroad waiting to be executed list behind Pakistan and Liberia. Lots of crimes from pirating to drug smuggling to murder. Again I would not wish you to quote that since I have not verified it.

However the 500 figure was banded about by the govt after the girl was beheaded - There are about 40 or so in Malaysia mainly on drug charges

What astounds me is we can save (and even pay and buy a house) to get someone from Saudi who is a convicted murderer and yet we cannot save someone who was forced into drug trafficking in Malaysia or Somalia..

The solution is to create work instead of trafficking these people - It is a fact that most Muslim nations ban the sending of maids etc to most Middle East countries - we do not...


serenityjam
3:52pm Dec 29, 2011

I hope that our government will explain why our people are allowed to go to dangerous places where their culture and laws are different from ours.

However, I would not agree that we have to rescue all of them from death row. We can mobilize our embassy personnel in those countries to monitor progress of their cases. But, if the person is really guilty like being charged for selling or buying drugs, we should let justice prevail and that person has to suffer for his or her evil actions. We should also be mindful of their victims. What about the families affected by drugs or the innocent people who will be destroyed by drug use? We should keep an open mind. We can also save more lives if the guilty is banished from this earth.

didikarjadi
9:24am Dec 29, 2011

DrDez - 500!...Do you know if this is unique to Indonesia? There seems to be something seriously wrong with our society. What the hell is going on?

didikarjadi
9:22am Dec 29, 2011

DrDez - of course the real solution to this problem is very simple. If instead of stealing and wasting money, the government were to invest in creating better educational facilities and employment opportunities within in Indonesia, the need to seek income abroad would cease. Which ever way one views this, the governments dishonesty, greed, hypocracy and incompetence is to blame.

Bayanah binti Banhawi’s return to Indonesia after spending six years in Saudi Arabia, mostly in jail, is permanent.

Bayanah landed at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport on Wednesday and was welcomed by her father, Banhawi, and her son, Andri Irawan, along with other family and friends.

She escaped beheading in Saudi Arabia for murder after the family of the victim agreed to pardon her in return for monetary compensation. The Indonesian Embassy paid a total of 55,000 riyal ($14,670) to the family.

Bayanah, 29, said she would not seek overseas work again. “I will not return because I am traumatized,” she said.

She said that she would focus on finding work at home so that she could take care of her son.

“The only thing that I’m thinking about now is finding work here and taking care of my son,” she said.

Bayanah said she had been convicted of killing the child of her employee, but insisted that the death had been an accident.

She said that she had inadvertently opened the tap for the hot water while bathing the child a brain damage sufferer. The boy was scalded and died after 12 days in the hospital.

Besides being sentenced to death, Bayanah said, she had received 300 lashes, which were given 50 time over a four-month span.

The Tangerang resident added that she had never received any pay for the three months that she worked for the family in Saudi Arabia.

“Until this day, I have not received a single cent,” she said.

Bayanah left for Saudi Arabia on Jan. 29, 2006. She had only been working for the family for about three months when she was accused of breaking the boy’s arm and scalding him, which led to his death.

She was imprisoned at a women’s jail in Riyadh on April 5 that year and tried for murder. She was sentenced to death, but in March 2009 her former employers pardoned her.

Her death sentence was commuted to five years and one month, and 300 lashes.

Bayanah was released this week, after Indonesia’s presidentially appointed task force on migrant workers had met with the governor of Riyadh in October. The governor ordered her release at that time.

“I am really happy. I never stopped praying for the safety of my daughter,” Banhawi said.

Bayanah’s 11-year-old son, Andri, was overcome at the reunion with his mother. “I am so because I really missed my mother,” he said.

He said he would do whatever he could to keep his mother from working overseas again.

Maftuh Basyuni, the head of the task force on migrant workers, said there were 30 Indonesian migrant workers on death row in Saudi Arabia but that seven had been spared capital punishment following lobbying by the government.

Among those who have been pardoned by the families of their victims are Jamilah binti Abidin Rofi’i and Neneng Sunengsih binti Mamih.

Jamilah is scheduled to arrive in Indonesia today and Neneng will arrive in a week or two, after she obtains her exit permit.