Regina Ip accused of racism over tales of Filipino maids bedding expat bosses
Exco member accused of racism over tales of Filipinos bedding expats
Executive councillor Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee refused to apologise to Hong Kong's Filipino community yesterday after sparking outrage by quoting anecdotes of domestic helpers seducing expatriate bosses and ruining marriages.
In an article that was later removed from her Facebook page and blog, Ip chastised the international media for only focusing on the misbehaviour of employers of domestic helpers - such as the abused Indonesian Erwiana Sulistyaningsih - and said they should not ignore "the issue of a large number of Filipino maids being turned into sexual resources for male foreigners".
In the controversial commentary, also published in the Chinese-language newspaper, the pro-Beijing lawmaker and former security secretary said during her time in office she had received complaints from "foreign women" living in Discovery Bay that the government was "allowing Filipino domestic helpers to seduce their husbands".
Ip said she told them she could not help because it would be difficult to regulate such matters under existing law. She went on to claim that friends in the expatriate community had told her many tales of families breaking up because the husbands were having affairs with their maids.
While the Filipino community reacted with anger, Civic Party lawmaker Claudia Mo Man-ching accused Ip of "blatant racism" and filed a complaint with the Equal Opportunities Commission yesterday.
The Asian Migrants' Co-ordinating Body, which champions domestic helpers' rights, demanded the Philippine government list Ip as an "undesirable alien" and ban her from entering their country.
Its spokesman Eman Villanueva said: "It is very racist as it is directed to a particular nationality. In many cases the foreign domestic helpers are sexually abused or harassed by their employers. That is more problematic than seducing their employers as it is up to the man [to decide] whether they will be seduced."
He said Ip, widely tipped to run for chief executive in 2017, should be pressing the government to protect maids instead of further victimising them.
Ip, who heads the pro-establishment New People's Party, was unrepentant when contacted by the yesterday.
"Why should I apologise?" she asked. "I have really received such complaints about the maids and I am only stating facts."
While she admitted she did not have quantitative data to support her claims, Ip said Hongkongers should not turn a blind eye to the problems.
Late last night she made an apology of sorts, but only for the picture that accompanied her Facebook post with the headline: “Lots of Filipino maids provide sex services to foreign men?” She blamed the graphic designer for a “misleading” visual.
