Originally posted on the Lebanese blog Ethiopian Suicides.

The show featured a 5 minute act where a couple was “negotiating” with a representative of a recruitment agency for a migrant domestic worker. The couple became aggressive and sexually explicit to the point where the recruitment agency representative responded to the couple: “Do you think that I am a pimp? I run a workers recruitment agency here!”. The “couple” then asks for a dirty maid, peeing unwillingly and smelling, and hitting children. The “husband” at the end of the video suggested to the recruiter “to shove up his *** the broomstick that their last maid had used before she jumped from the balcony”. At that point, when we understood that the couple are upset because of the suicide of their maid, the couple’s sudden unwarranted slurs and foul language are covered by a long sequences of “beeping”!

This is not MTV’s first time racist shows. MTV’s odious, unethical and immoral show comes at a time when Lebanese and international media keep reporting on the trafficking and slavery of migrant domestic workers in Lebanon.

You can read here Ethiopian Suicides’ take with some social media comments reproduced in the post.

And you can read here Anti Racism Movement’s commentary.

As for the video itself, you can view it on this link. Do read the comments under it.

This news came just one day before the Guardian published a report about Lila, a Nepalese who was trafficked into slavery and committed suicide in Lebanon.

Originally posted on Ethiopian Suicides.

Minister Nahas’ “revolutionary” declarations came during a conference organized by Insan Association at La Sagesse University in Beirut on “Empowerment and Social Inclusion of Migrant Domestic Workers in Lebanon”, while sitting in between the Spanish Ambassador to Lebanon and the Dean of the Faculty of Law in La Sagesse. This is a major shift in policy with previous ministers of labor and came as a surprise to all conference participants.

Minister Nahas explained “so-called system of the sponsorship or guarantor (kafala) does not exist in Lebanese law.” He clarified that the term was imported from Arab countries where the practice is common, and brought into practice in Lebanon by the Lebanese General Security.

Today, Nahas reiterated via his Twitter account his refusal of a bill specific to foreign domestic workers. “Any labor law that takes into account the nationality of the worker is tantamount to racial discrimination,” he wrote in Arabic.

Earlier in 2011, UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary forms of Slavery, Ms. Gulnara Shahinian, refrained from suggesting to abolish the sponsorship system in Lebanon because, as Ms. Shahinian has said, she did not have time to explore the alternatives to the sponsorship system, and she did not view labor laws as a viable alternative. Equally, minister Nahas is going against the current global legislative trend which separates domestic work from normal labor as embodied in the recent work towards a Convention on Decent Work for Domestic Workers.

Minister Nahas’ overarching policy in the ministry of labor is to favor Lebanese over foreign workers. This has recently led to a significantly higher rate of denial of work permits to foreigners requested by Lebanese employers. In the words of minister Nahas, “we cannot keep exporting our youth and importing foreign workers”.

Below are excerpts from Joey’s experiences. See his full post here.

I’d like to share a story that’s not really easy to tell and which has something to do with what Sari wrote in the previous post. Not surprisingly since I can’t seem to shut up about it, most of my friends know that I spent 2 months in Madagascar last summer.

[...]

Androka and Antsikoroke – a village closer to Ambohibola – were part of the villages that have seen women leave to work in Lebanon and I had the fortune, or rather misfortune, to find out that two of these women are now missing. The Androka woman was supposed to return home 3 years ago and the Antsikoroke woman was supposed to return home 12 years ago. Shocked yet? Let me continue, the Androka woman stopped sending money home at one point for no known reason and the Antsikoroke never even contacted her family. Now you might think I’m jumping to conclusions here by claiming that both women are probably enslaved or dead but what if I told you that 17 Malagasy maids died in Lebanon last year? What if I told you that foreign domestic workers are not covered by Lebanon’s labor laws?

We are basically telling them that they may be miserable enough to leave their country in search of money to feed their families and come to ours only to expect to be treated as sub-humans.

Back to Madagascar. It took me a few seconds to hit rock bottom when I was talking to an elderly man in Androka. He was the woman’s grandfather and he stopped talking when I told him where I’m from. He couldn’t look me in the eyes. He lowered his head and went back inside his house. Mr Cheban, our translator, didn’t know what to say as I stood there blank-faced. He tried to comfort me – we talked about women coming to Lebanon as maids the day before – but couldn’t find the words. I repeat, HE tried to comfort ME. It was my fellow citizens who have caused this suffering, and it was one of that woman’s fellow citizens who was trying to comfort me. I uttered no more words that day.

[...]

I couldn’t describe the feeling of shame and disgust that I had felt at that moment towards my so-called fellow citizens of Lebanon. I know we Lebanese are used to complaining about everything. We even have “neswen el 7ay” (women of the neighborhood) who do it on a daily basis. But that was different. I wasn’t even complaining. I simply did not know what to say. I couldn’t justify it in any way, I was simply part of a gigantic crime that involves a few millions of people. The situation that foreign workers have to endure in Lebanon may be better in some cases than the slaves of Dubai – I’ve had the opportunity to see them as well – who are left with cleaning the floor behind the rich shoppers and driving them around, but we can simply give no excuses.

[...]

I’ll leave you with a relatively happy thought:

I can’t describe how warm I felt when I was around these people. I know that my fellow volunteer, roommate and good friend Eirik from Norway could back me up on this. We spent hours talking about how unusually secure and comfortable we were around these people. Despite barely speaking more than a few sentences in each other’s native languages, we were still able to bond quite well. I left that place with warm goodbyes and “come back soon” wishes and I sure as hell plan on going back. The differences that every culture exhibits is dwarfed by the universal similarities that we all share despite how convinced we are of the uniqueness of our own culture. The pathetic titles we give to each other all serve social roles and have no actual substances independent of context. The reason why Malagasy, Sri Lankas, Ethiopians, Filipinos and others come to Lebanon for work is simply because they don’t have enough cash in their pockets. That’s it. You have nothing whatsoever that makes you more special. You’re simply luckier. You got the easier role within our globalized world. Give it some thought and stop believing that sad lie that you were somehow chosen.

Click here to continue reading Joey’s piece.

No additional information was given. The last recorded death of an Ethiopian domestic worker in Lebanon was on November 16, 2011, presumably a suicide.

This suicides comes one day after CNN produced a damning report on abuse of domestic workers in Lebanon. In this report, Nadim Houry from human rights watch quotes the Ethiopian ambassador who had told him: “I’m no longer running an embassy here. I’m running a morgue”.

Shahinian is the first independent UN expert to evaluate government responsiveness to contemporary slavery in Lebanon. But she is not the first to admonish Lebanese oversight failures; HRW documented cases of abuse in a report last year. They found that the regulatory system was ineffective and failed to reprehend or punish employers who abused their workers. This judicial void where migrants are concerned limits the ability to redress exploitation and further normalizes abuse into society. (Click here to see the full report).

But a coherent, robust rule of law needs to be created before it can be enforced. A bill that would reinvigorate migrant law has dawdled in the legislature for over three years. With, on average, at least one domestic worker dying every week in Lebanon (due to work-related dangers, employer abuse, and suicide), the government’s lackadaisical attitude directly endangers migrant well-being.

Shahinian advised the Lebanese government to implement legislation that would ensure all sides act fairly; this would include regulations for employers and recruitment agencies, as well as guarantees for migrants such as “freedom of movement,” and modification of the visa/sponsorship laws that foster conditions leading to domestic servitude. Shahinian emphasized that there are benefits to both parties; the over 200,000 domestic workers themselves would feel secure, and in return for ensuring a positive, safe environment, Lebanon wold continue to attract the work force that it so heavily depends upon. Read more about Shahinian’s experiences and proposals here and here.

Shahinian hopes her reports, backed by the weight of the UN, will encourage Lebanon to reposition its stance towards migrant conditions promptly and assertively.

Below is an interview with Alex Shams, a founder and current public relations coordinator of MWTF. Alex has been a key organizer with the force since its inception and continues to advocate on its behalf from his residence in the United States. Visit the MWTF blog to track their incredible efforts and find out how you, too, can take action.

What was your motivation to start the MW Task Force? Can you tell us about the team you’ve assembled?

Just under a year ago a few of us came into contact with Aimee, a Malagasy migrant worker who is active in defending the human rights of migrant workers in Lebanon. Her work is focused around direct social work and makes use of her access and intimate knowledge of the situation facing migrant workers, and particularly migrant domestic workers, in this country.

We began at this point thinking- how can we advance and support her work and the work of people like her, and how can we involve the many people- both Lebanese and foreigners- who are passionate about this human rights crisis? We were not an NGO and we were all engaged in either our jobs or our studies, so we understood from the beginning that whatever we did had to be based on a volunteer collective. After a few planning meetings, we decided to focus on language classes for migrant workers in Lebanon, as most Lebanese speak multiple languages and this is something that can be shared between individuals. Also, many migrant workers in Lebanon face many hurdles because of their limited language abilities. And so our first project was to set up weekly language classes.

Can you tell us more about your language project, and how we and others can help?

We offer Arabic, English, and French classes to migrant workers for free every Sunday. These classes have been going on for about 9 months now, and have attracted over 100 students and about 50 teachers (though only about a fifth of students and teachers attend every week). Both students and teachers are volunteers, a fact necessitated by the fact that very few migrant domestic workers in Lebanon receive one day off a week, and thus cannot attend regularly. Despite this, the classes have been very successful. In addition, for the classes we have developed and continue to develop a curriculum that is suitable to the needs and specific circumstances of migrant domestic workers in Lebanon.

The biggest need for us is always teachers! We always need more volunteers to come and teach languages for our classes because we always have extremely eager and committed students. Right now the classes are extremely personalized- about 4-5 students per teacher- and we hope to retain this level. Please contact us if you are in Lebanon and are free for 2 hours on Sundays!

What are the toughest challenges you face with your campaign and advocacy work?

The biggest issue we face in our advocacy is ignorance about the rights of migrant workers. Many people seem to consider these workers less than human in some way and do not understand that as workers they are entitled to the same rights that a Lebanese worker expects to receive. Even very educated people often do not recognize locking a worker in the house as imprisonment or having her work 7 days a week as slavery, and so often people do not understand why we seek to work with migrant workers.

We are the first volunteer collective in Lebanon focused on this issue, and so our very work raises awareness to the moral crisis Lebanon faces because of its horrific treatment of migrant workers. There are some excellent organizations working on improving the legal situation of migrant domestic workers; as volunteers, however, we are continuing to struggle to enact grassroots change in people’s mentalities while we work with migrant workers to develop the skills needed to defend their rights. Through fundraising and cultural events as well as through video awareness campaigns

Is this project currently funded or do you rely primarily on donations? Do you have any regional or international partners?

We are volunteers and we have absolutely no funding. All money we raise goes directly to the causes we serve; whether this be financially supporting human rights workers from within the migrant communities or making copies of lessons for students in our language classes.

I encourage everyone in whatever country they may be to start similar volunteer collectives. A group of us with little experience began this project of our own volition and based on our own passions and with no money, so I hope people elsewhere will follow this example and skill sharing between migrant workers and people across the region will grow!