Manila--Filipina maid Mary Jane Veloso faces imminent execution in Indonesia, but relatives say her only crime was to fall victim to international drug gangs who are threatening to kill them if they speak out.
Echoing horror stories told by hundreds of other Filipinos in jails around the world, the 30-year-old single mother claims she was duped into ferrying narcotics.
She insists she would never have gambled her life and two sons' futures on a bag of heroin. But she is one of several foreigners whose executions for drug crimes are drawing closer in Indonesia.
Veloso believes, according to her parents, that she was tricked by a criminal gang as she desperately sought work overseas as a maid.
Her father, Cesar, 59, said those involved in setting up his daughter had repeatedly contacted him and other relatives to warn them against going public.
"My daughter's recruiters have been threatening us... they threatened to kill us one by one," the father said as he cried and his grandsons sat silently next to him during an interview in Manila.
Veloso lived in a poor farming region about three hours' drive north of Manila. Life became increasingly tough after she broke up with her sons' father and had to provide for them alone.
She flew to Malaysia after being promised a job there, but was told on arrival that the only work available was actually in Indonesia, her parents said.
While in Malaysia, the drugs were secretly sewn into her suitcase, according to her parents.
Veloso was arrested five years ago at Yogyakarta airport with 2.6 kilogrammes (5.73 pounds) of heroin in her suitcase. She is on death row with others including two Australians and a Frenchman whose legal appeals are all but exhausted.
AFP
