By Photographer, Star-Bulletin
Katrina, center, is comforted by Linda Guting and Nic Musico,
officials of the Filipino Coalition for Solidarity.
Abused in sex bar,
teen finds haven here
Isle Filipino Coalition for Solidarity
By Susan Kreifels
is a godsend for exploited workers
Star-BulletinKatrina turns 16 Monday, finally getting a taste of sweetness in her otherwise bitter dose of life. Hawaii's Filipino Coalition for Solidarity has provided the teen-
age girl haven since March from her grim life on Saipan, where she said she had been sexually exploited in a barroom since she was 14.
The civil rights advocacy group hopes to find a way to keep her in the United States, far from threats from her former employers, who now face a federal lawsuit on Saipan for alleged violations of child labor and wage laws.
Katrina is the young girl's stage name. Her real name is being withheld to protect her identity in the eighth-grade classroom she now attends on Oahu.
Born in Manila to a poor squatter family, she ran away when she was 13, ending up in the arms of unscrupulous recruiters.
Although she admits she lied that she was 19 in the beginning, Katrina said she later told the recruiters her real age.
But, according to the girl, the recruiters arranged a passport that claimed she was born in 1974 instead of 1981.
Katrina ended up in Saipan, where her recruiter-boss promised to make her a "starlet." But for the then 14-year-old, it was a horror role in which customers abused her naked body and had live sex with her and other bar girls on stage.
Performances, she said, were videotaped. If she didn't do what she was told, her bosses threatened to ship her back to the Philippines at her own expense.
"I was scared. I don't have any money. What happens to me? Maybe I will die."
Katrina describes her life as one much older than her years.
She and other Filipino women who worked in the Saipan bar stayed in barracks, virtual prisoners who couldn't go out. "They treated us like animals."
She sent most of her salary home to her mother.
"In school, I was very religious. I feel there is no God anymore. I prayed but no response," she said.
She drank alcohol every night because "it's easier to do anything if you're drunk. You can't really feel anything.
"I try to put it behind me. Sometimes I think, how did I do that? Animal people only do that. I get depressed."
Last October she went to government labor officials on Saipan and filed a complaint, which led to the U.S. Department of Labor lawsuit. Her former employers tried to bribe her to give up her complaint, "but I wanted to see justice."
And, she says with some disbelief, "after all I experienced, suddenly I'm here."
Nic Musico of the Filipino Coalition for Solidarity said the Hawaii group has been monitoring abuse of Filipino workers in the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory 3,900 miles west of Hawaii, for the last four years. The group has given haven to other Filipino workers. Coalition monitors Saipan
The commonwealth, which doesn't fall under U.S. wage or immigration laws, offers low minimum wages ($2.95) and tax incentives that have fueled Saipan's $500 million-a-year garment industry. More than 30,000 imported laborers from the Philippines, China and other Asian countries work the mills on this small island of 25,000 citizens. The government says without the foreign workers, its garment and tourism industry would collapse.
There were more than 500 labor complaints filed last year, according to the commonwealth government. Some are passed along to the U.S. Department of Labor to pursue. In 1994 the department successfully sued a Japanese company that owned several bars employing underage girls.
The lawsuit involving Katrina and her co-workers, filed in the U.S. District Court in Saipan, is not expected to go to trial until late this year. Defendants Eugene R. Zamora Sr. and Marylou "Malou" Zamora, whom Katrina said brought her to Saipan from the Philippines, are believed to have returned to their home country. Defendant Francisco Matsunaga, the Zamoras' partner at the Club Kalesa, where Katrina worked, died last November.
Michael Bayer, wage and hour investigator on Saipan for the U.S. Department of Labor, said the foreign workers are tied to one-year contracts they know don't have to be renewed.
"The more abused, poor, desperate they are in their home country, the more willing they are to put up with someplace else," said Bayer, emphasizing he was giving a personal opinion rather than an official one. "They have no voice. There are no unions. The only outlet is to file a complaint."
There are moves in Congress to force the commonwealth to comply with U.S. wage and immigration laws. Last week President Clinton sent commonwealth Gov. Froilan C. Tenorio a letter warning that his administration would work with Congress to extend U.S. laws there. Clinton sends warning
"The minimum wage is plainly inadequate; there have been persistent incidents of improper treatment of alien workers and inadequate enforcement of their rights; and manufacturers using foreign workers unfairly compete with other production under the U.S. flag," Clinton's letter said. He said he would work with Congress to amend the 1976 covenant that created a political union with the islands and made their residents U.S. citizens but allowed the commonwealth to control its immigration and minimum wages.
Dave Ecret, acting public information officer for Tenorio's office, said the commonwealth has made "tremendous improvements" in the labor situation and believes Clinton has been misinformed of the current situation.
Some Republicans in Congress agree. Rep. Dick Armey, House majority leader, and Rep. Tom DeLay, House majority whip, assured Tenorio this week in a letter that any legislation that would "harm the economic, social or political well being of the CNMI is counter to the principles of the Republican Party, and this Congress has no intention of voting on such legislation." The two commended the islands for their commitment to ending labor problems.
Hawaii's Sen. Daniel Akaka, a Democrat, said yesterday that he supported Clinton's letter and would work to bring changes in the commonwealth, where "horror stories of labor abuses continue to abound, while CNMI (commonwealth) officials launch a public relations campaign touting the territory as an economic model for the rest of the nation." Akaka backs Clinton
Ecret said the government has forced companies to clean up workers' barracks and doubled the commonwealth government's immigration and labor staffs to more quickly resolve abuse cases.
Ecret also said businesses must pay room and board in addition to minimum wages, raising the cost of labor on Saipan. He said any changes in labor and immigration laws on Saipan would be "devastating" to the economy.
While politicians debate the bigger issues, members of the Filipino Coalition for Solidarity are working to protect the people caught up in them, like Katrina. Musico said his group has solicited people to adopt Katrina, but time is running out -- an adoption application must be filed before she turns 16. Musico is more optimistic that she will be granted special asylum.
For now, Katrina has been given permission to stay in the United States until November.
Hawaii's safe haven has given Katrina a chance at a normal teen-age life. For a moment she forgets about her tragic life on Saipan and sounds like any teen-ager.
"I really hate math," she complained.
