Migrant Care executive director Wahyu Susilo said Indonesia’s foreign ministry must demand that the perpetrators be suitably prosecuted and help collect evidence to expose how the 26-year-old had become victimised.
He said it was shocking, for example, that Adelina was reportedly forced to sleep beside a pet dog in the house of her employers.
“This has crossed the limits of humanitarian conduct,” he said in an interview with Jakarta-based Metro TV yesterday.
He said the matter must be highlighted at a meeting of the heads of Indonesia’s overseas missions which began at the foreign ministry in the capital yesterday. The meeting was officiated by President Joko Widodo.
Susilo said the ministry should work to uncover the alleged abuses inflicted on Adelina and ensure that the Malaysian police investigate and take relevant court action on the case.
It should also require the embassy in Malaysia to help determine the steps to be taken in the prosecution and ensure that they are thorough, he said.
Susilo added that Adelina, who hailed from Indonesia’s East Nusa Tenggara province, may be a victim of human trafficking which he said was a critical problem in the region.
Yesterday, Indonesian media reported the foreign ministry’s director for overseas citizen protection, Lalu Muhammad Iqbal, as saying that although Adelina had entered Malaysia legally the first time, she may have resorted to other means the second time before her death.
Neni Kurniati, the Indonesian consul in Penang, said Adelina had been working with her current employer in Bukit Mertajam since December 2014, based on the data from her passport.
She said Adelina had a valid passport and the consulate was checking if she had a valid permit to work in Malaysia.
“A search should be undertaken on which parties were involved in Adelina’s (employment) placement because there is suspicion that she entered Malaysia unofficially,” Susilo said.
He added that the Indonesian government should not discriminate in demanding justice based on whether a citizen overseas was documented or not, reminding Jakarta that this was a human rights concern.
Police in Penang are investigating the case for murder and have arrested two siblings, aged 36 and 39, and their 60-year-old mother.
Adelina, who died at the Bukit Mertajam Hospital on Sunday, had been working at the family’s semi-detached house in the Taman Kota Permai residential area.
She was spotted by a concerned neighbour with wounds on her hands and legs. According to the forensic pathologist, the cause of death was identified as “multi-organ failure secondary to anaemia” and it was possible that she had suffered neglect.