RIYADH: A Indonesian woman who had been given the death sentence for practicing witchcraft and later reduced to three-year imprisonment is now ready to fly back home, thanks to the humanitarian justice system here and the efforts put in by the consulate.
Domestic help Rika Mustikawati, who hails from Sukaresmi, Bogor, West Java in Indonesia, was sentenced to death on May 15, 2012 by a local court in Bisha, Asir province, for practicing witchcraft on her employer’s wife.
She was working legally in the Kingdom since 2009.
Subsequently, in November 2012, the legal team from the Indonesian Consulate in Jeddah made efforts and succeeded as the Appeals Court decided to annul the death sentence and recommended a fresh hearing with a new judge.
The new trial resulted in Mustikawati’s sentence being reduced from capital punishment to three years' imprisonment.
It was after the Appeals Court verdict that the legal team from the consulate began work to secure her release. “After pursuing the matter for consideration, the case is closed now; she is relieved and will fly home,” Syarif Shahab, information secretary at the Indonesian Consulate in Jeddah, told Arab News on Tuesday.
Asked when she is going to fly back to home, he said, “hopefully on August 6th.”
He said that Mustikawati was about to leave last week but her departure was halted by immigration authorities on administrative issues and that they are expecting her departure very soon, hopefully on Aug. 6. The consulate will do all it can to make sure she is sent home, he added.
Notably, Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno L. P. Marsudi was also following the matter with his counterpart in the Kingdom and persuaded authorities to swiftly settle all legal cases involving Indonesian nationals in the Kingdom.
According to the Indonesian foreign ministry’s directorate of legal aid and protection of Indonesian nationals overseas, the government has secured the release of 12 Indonesian citizens so far in 2015, from death sentences in Saudi Arabia.
“With the recent release, the number of Indonesians freed from death row in Saudi Arabia since 2011 has reached 68 people,” it said.
According to foreign ministry records, 24 Indonesian citizens are currently in prison facing the death sentence and legal processes for them are in progress.
“Out of the total, 12 people face murder charges, nine are on adultery charges and three face black magic charges,” an Indonesian foreign ministry statement said.
Maid who escaped death sentence set to fly home
