8 women escape from disco bar

Sunday, February 12, 2012

THREE minors, three pregnant women and two others have escaped from a newly opened disco club in Baguio City.

Innabuyog-Gabriela Secretary General Mila Singson received report that women at the Monro Disco Bar along Bokawkan Road were asking to be rescued from being exploited.

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Singson asked the police to save the women and the Baguio City Police Office-Women and Children Protection Center (BCPO-WCPC) then instructed the girls to try to escape and proceed to their office.

On February 9, all eight women were able to escape from the disco bar through an unlocked gate.

The women said an owner of a massage parlor in Davao City recruited them and promised them work with high salaries. They arrived in Baguio City last February 1 and worked in Monro Disco Bar.

The women said they were not given food allowance and were not allowed to go out of the compound of the newly opened disco bar even during the day. They added they were made to work from 8 p.m. to 4 a.m. and received P100 only for daily allowance.

When they asked for cash advances to send to their families in Davao, the recruiter would just ignore them.

The women also asked bar owner Henry Soo for a cash advance as it was part of the deal made with the recruiter but Soo refused, saying “they must work for their compensation.”

They also found out from Soo that P130,000 was given to the recruiter as payment for having them to work in the bar.

When the women escaped, they proceeded to the BCPO-WCPC where Singson and the other staff of Innabuyog-Gabriela met them.

All of them were later brought to the Department of Social Welfare and Development-Cordillera office while Singson processed the assistance to enable them to return to Davao and provide for food and other needs.