• Rosdiana Abdul Rahim, 32, has pleaded not guilty to seven charges, all of them relating to her alleged abuse of domestic helper Mayang Sari
• The allegations include kicking the Indonesian national in the crotch, and forcing her to shower in front of Rosdiana
• Rosdiana’s husband Muhammad Ridzwan Rashid testified that his wife is “naggy” and has a “bulldog face” but is not violent
• Mr Ridzwan said Ms Mayang would have had opportunities to raise the alarm if she was being abused by Rosdiana

SINGAPORE — The husband of a 32-year-old woman who is accused of forcing her domestic worker to shower in front of her and kicking the woman in the crotch, along with other forms of physical abuse, said that his wife is “naggy” and has a “bulldog face” but is not a violent person. 

The domestic worker Mayang Sari, a 21-year-old Indonesian, was “fed up” with the constant nagging of his wife, Rosdiana Abdul Rahim, in the lead-up to her filing of a police report, said Mr Muhammad Ridzwan Rashid, who was testifying as a defence witness on Monday (Nov 30).

The part-time Grab and Lalamove driver, who was a police officer for 13 years, said he had never known Rosdiana to use force on children or anyone else, although she had locked their young children in a room on occasions to make them “cry a bit” when they were naughty.

Mr Ridzwan challenged allegations set out in one of the seven charges being contested by his wife that she had pinched the maid’s breast, kicked her crotch and closed a cupboard door on her forearm.

“The way you describe it sounds like a martial arts movie,” he said in response to questioning by his wife’s lawyer Dhillon Singh.

“I know her (my wife). Sometimes, she sits too long… I also need to carry her up because she has problems with her knees. I don’t think she can do this kick to the vaginal (area).”

Rosdiana Abdul Rahim, who is accused of abusing her domestic helper Mayang Sari. Photo: Lydia Lam/CNA

He added: “I admit that my wife did tell her (when she made a mistake). As a woman, she likes to nag. My wife nags a lot, but I’ve never seen with my eyes that she physically hit or touched her.”

At the start of her trial in April, Rosdiana pleaded not guilty to seven charges — all alleging the ill-treatment of Ms Mayang between September and December in 2017 at a condominium, where she lived with her husband and their two twin children who were five years old then.

Other charges alleged that she poured talcum powder onto Ms Mayang’s face, causing some powder to enter her eyes and inflict pain, that she pulled the helper’s shirt until one of the buttons came loose, and pulled her bra until one of the bra hooks came off.

She also allegedly failed to grant the helper adequate rest daily and threatened to harm her family in Lampung, on the Indonesian island of Sumatra.

Mr Ridzwan told the court that Ms Mayang had not confided in him about the alleged abuse, nor did she call for help. He noted that they live on the first floor and the guard post is “just a shout away”. 

Thus, the allegations in the police report came as a “big shock” to him, he said.

“Mayang Sari has all the time to tell me. She knows I am not the naggy type… but no, she did not approach me… If anything happens, she can call for help at any point, but she did not call for help. She did not tell me. So (the report) really, really surprised me,” he said.

Asked if Rosdiana is a moody person, he said people may think that she is stern and fierce owing to what he called her “bulldog face” and that she does not smile much, but she is not that way if people get to know her, adding that she just “likes to talk a lot”.

“If you are scolded, then it becomes a nag. If you are not scolded, then it becomes a talk. That’s her. She has met a lot of people because she is in the business line. When you are in the customer service line, you talk to people nicely, not shout and speak in crude words,” he said.

Without pinpointing which alleged behaviour he was referring to, he added: “If she is like that, I also don’t want to live with her. (But we had been married for more than) 10 years already!”

Ms Mayang had earlier testified that Rosdiana claimed she was smelly and had forced her to shower in front of her in November 2017 by spraying water all over her with her clothes still on and putting “a lot of shampoo” over her head, before telling her to remove all of her wet clothing.

She had also told the court that as she was trying to rinse the shampoo off that day, Mr Ridzwan happened to walk into the bedroom looking for something so she tried to cover herself. 

Ms Mayang also said that after she had bathed, Rosdiana told her to change her clothes outside the bathroom, at a spot when her husband was in a position to see her.

Mr Ridzwan, however, said that he had never seen the domestic worker naked. Asked if his wife had ever made the helper strip, he said: “Of course, no. Definitely, no. She is so... jealous. My phone, she also checks.”

As for the allegation that his wife had threatened to harm her family in Indonesia, Mr Ridzwan said Ms Mayang was being “quite manipulative” to claim that.

“She manipulated in a way that it was a threat, but there was never any threat… My wife keeps on nagging. That’s why I think she cannot take it.”

If convicted of insulting the modesty of Ms Mayang, Rosdiana could be jailed up to one-and-a-half years or fined, or both.

For each of her two charges of using criminal force on the worker without grave and sudden provocation, she could face up to another three months in jail or a fine of up to S$1,500, or both.

Ill-treating the worker by pouring powder onto her face — an act that contravenes a condition under the Employment of Foreign Manpower (Work Passes) Regulations 2012 — could put her in jail for up to another year or fined up to S$10,000, or both.

If convicted of threatening to harm Ms Mayang's family, she could be jailed up to two years or fined, or both.

If convicted of voluntarily causing hurt to Ms Mayang — pinching her breast, kicking her in the crotch and closing the cupboard door on her forearm — Rosdiana faces up to another three years in jail or a fine of up to S$7,500, or both.

For not granting the worker enough rest, she could be jailed up to a year in jail or fined up to S$10,000, or both.

Rosdiana remains out on bail.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Angela Ang said that she will be applying for two rebuttal witnesses to testify after Mr Ridzwan. They are an investigation officer and the accused’s mother.

The trial continues.