The often extralegal existence of domestic workers, the prioritization of Saudi employers, and the correspondingly ad-hoc legal verdicts, are particularly pronounced characteristics of this case. Nafeek has been awaiting an official response to her request for clemency since 2007. In November, Sri Lankan officials traveled to Saudi Arabia to ask Rafeek’s former employers for forgiveness in accordance with Saudi’s pardoning laws. But allegedly false accounts of the delegation’s work made by a Sri Lankan parliament member may have Jeopardized Nafeek’s prospects. Shaik Faisal al Otaibi, leader of the Othibi tribe to which Nafeek’s former employers belong, threatened Nafeek’s case will be impacted by the MP’s suggestion that the Othibi tribe has more than one leader. Furthermore, Otaibi claims the Sri Lankan delegation lied about the current circumstances of Nafeeks case, as neither the tribe nor the Saudi government has indicated Nafeek will be released. The leader, who was appointed by King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, is demanding an apology.

Saudi Arabia’s legal policy towards migrants is volatile to the detriment of these workers, as well as to the groups and governments working on their behalf. However, if Otaibi’s claims are true, the Sri Lankan government must also accept responsibility; whether the delegation truly deceived the Sri Lankan parliament and public, or whether the delegation clumsily mishandled their assignment, the government did not act with the swift resolution that Nafeek so desperately needs. Faith in the Sri Lankan government’s mission has been meager since its outset.

Rizana’s situation reflects the wider relationship existing between Saudi Arabia and migrant-exporting nations, in which migrant-exporters often approach legal cases and permanent policy change with timidity in fear of disrupting the important economic bond. Otaibi’s suggestion that the “false words” of the MP will ruin both Rizana’s case and the Saudi-Sri Lanka relationship demonstrates the convoluted, exponentially weaker position of migrant workers fated to the Saudi legal system.

Lebanon witnessed two cases of suicide last week alone. The blog Ethiopian Suicides catalogs many Ethiopian deaths in Lebanon as the country possesses a large Ethiopian population, as well as a dismal record of migrant rights. Both cases involved a Lebanese domestic worker hanging herself in an employer’s home – almost certainly the source of their misery.

Another Ethiopian woman hung herself in her sponsor’s home in Saudi Arabia, where paltry workers rights and neglected conditions also have a history of pushing maids to commit suicide. Police are investigating the incident according to routine procedure, though the causes of suicide are generally standard themselves – as are the effectively nonexistent punishment for abusive employers.

In Kuwait, where disregard for the plight of domestic workers appears normalized, a woman unsuccessfully attempted to overdose with items from employer’s house. Police investigations have again commenced to determine the woman’s motivation – as if the reasons for her agony could be separated from the life that sponsors almost entirely dictate and create. Another domestic worker attempted to commit suicide in her sponsor’s home as well, but was ‘thwarted’ by police, who then proceeded to interrogate her.

These suicides and suicide attempts come amidst promises for substantive legal change made by many countries; Kuwait agreed to increase the minimum wage for domestic workers, Saudi has promised more protections for its workers, and Lebanon’s minister announced the Kafala system’s forthcoming abolishment. Whether these agreements affect the lives of domestic workers and mitigate the conditions that preempt suicide – or whether they are lost into abyss of broken treaties and pacts – will, at least tangentially, be measured by this year’s suicide rate.

Originally posted on the Lebanese blog Ethiopian Suicides.

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.

After months of negotiation, Saudi assented to these demands in an accord signed in Manilla. The agreement stipulated a minimum wage of $400//month, a weekly day off, holiday time totaling thirty days, and a free ticket for migrants to return to their home country. The accord also targets several of the most prevalent abuses, rendering it illegal to withhold maids’ passports, to treat them poorly, or to force them to work in multiple households.

While legal protections for domestic workers is a significant achievement in the Gulf region, the effect of the agreement cannot be determined until Saudi’s commitments are ratified in legislation and mechanisms of enforcement are implemented.

The article is written from the perspective of a Saudi employer who, after years of consciously avoiding the entanglement of profiteering and corruption that characterizes the foreign domestic service market, finally gives in to temptation and initiates his quest for a foreign maid. The introduction gives the impression that the author is primarily concerned with contributing to an enterprise indifferent to the exploitative conditions it begets. But when speaking of corruption and exploitation, the author almost exclusively refers to the victimization of Saudi employers.

He explains his own encounters as well as those of others. For his part, he claims to have been blackmailed by the employment office. He expresses his outrage that such a crime could happen under the watchful eye of the relevant embassies – the embassies that largely fail to regulate these same agencies even with the well-being of their own citizens at risk. He continues with anecdotes from his acquaintances, from news articles (we must assume), and hearsay from the grapevine; this includes nefarious scheming on the part of maids, who cooperate with agencies in pretending to be experienced with housework, and to be “good” for three months – the period an employment agency remains legally responsible for her work. It is presented as wholly conceivable that a maid could “pretend” to be experienced for three entire months without her employer realizing she is unskilled at ironing, washing dishes, etc. He describes a semi-theoretical, generalized trajectory of a maid’s behavior: She is swell and docile for three to four months, fulfilling all of her obligations (even though in truth she does not possesses the applicable skills and is in fact hoodwinking her employer), and then she suddenly undergoes a tremendous change – she’s rude, she can no longer cook, she can no longer launder – she may even abscond.

The author does admit that both the rights of maids and Saudi employers are violated by employment agency tactics. There is certainly truth to this statement, as agencies are notorious for their largely unregulated behavior. Saudi employers do have the right to be upset when they are swindled out of their own money. However, the suggestion of a large-scale conspiracy between migrant workers and these agencies is unbelievable and dangerous; the notion that the average maid would want to abscond from steady employment in a non-abusive household to return home, after the extraordinarily arduous process of immigration, where the prospect of employment is significantly lower – all for for a one time-sum, is difficult to fathom. The author also recounts the story of a friend whose maid absconded, but was later found working in the employment agency’s office. Certainly possible in one instance – but absolutely implausible as the systematic practice the author suggests. Similarly, the author’s other notion that thieving migrants abscond after their three month commitment only to obtain new passports and work permits to continue bamboozling Suadis nationwide is preposterous given that the legitimate documentation process is difficult enough, not to mention the severe penalties illegal migrants, as well as absconding migrants, face.

Perhaps the article is not devious in its intention, but its effect is to support the misperception of foreign domestic workers in the Gulf. Such pieces encourage suspicion towards maids, exacerbating the already tense relationship that exists between so many migrants and their sponsors. Furthermore, it designates migrants as the principal problem while relegating the stories of abuse, slavery, and exploitation to mere stereotypes used to hide the somehow more perturbing manipulation of Gulf employers. It overshadows the darker experiences of domestic workers, who are subject to the invisible sphere of the home and often excluded from labor legislation, with a narrative that centers on economics – rather than human rights.

While migrant workers are not the only victims in the foreign domestic service complex, they are the most seriously affected. This article only adds to the myriad of irresponsible pieces that trivialize migrant abuse in the Gulf.

In the first case, the Indonesian Consulate fell into its old habits - failing to intervene in the woman’s case until she had been sentenced death. In receiving no representation or even translation services throughout her trial, Mesi binti Dama Idon underwent a lonely journey in a foreign legal system that had disappeared so many migrants before her. While Indonesia ultimately secured her freedom, the unnerving, lengthy process could have been avoided if litigation assistance was provided from the trial’s commencement.

Migrant Care executive director Anis Hidayah has criticized Indonesia’s modus operandi in the past, most recently telling The Jakarta Post that:

Almost all the workers who have avoided beheading in Saudi Arabia had undergone a very long and arduous legal battle. Some of them had actually been imprisoned for more than 10 years [before having their sentences commuted].”

But in what may represent an incremental improvement in the full assumption of responsibility to its overseas citizens, the Indonesian task force provided Neneng Sunengsih with a lawyer, who was able to persuade the courts that there was not enough evidence to convict her. Migrants accused of similar crimes in Saudi Arabia are often sentenced to death.

The task force alo announced that seven other Indonesian citizens will soon receive pardons from the King. While Indonesia’s ad-hoc policy is problematic in that it avoids comprehensive legislation changes in Saudi Arabia, these efforts may designate a shift towards more assertive diplomacy.

The UN Refugee Agency has published several reports condemning Oman for failing to address rampant employer abuse and exploitation, as well as for subjecting migrants to poor living and working conditions. A list of the agency’s reports can be found here.

Excerpt:

I am a proud Omani, but the general attitude among locals here towards South Asians & Southeast Asians makes me sick. I’m using housemaids as an example only. The same applies to construction workers who have built this country block by block (literally) and other low-skilled laborers. Whenever I try to discuss this with colleagues or friends, they claim that the abuse of migrant laborers is worse in other GCC countries and that laborers are better off in Oman. As if that justifies ill-treating another human being!

The aim of this column isn’t to criticize government policies, per se, but rather to address the issue from a human perspective. Nearly sixty years ago my father’s family lived in a cave in the mountains of Dhofar. My grandmother was out with the animals from sunrise to sunset. Like most Dhofaris living in the mountains at the time, every day was a struggle to find food and water. Today, almost every single Omani household has one or two maids whom they treat with very little respect. What went wrong along the way and when did we stop being humble?

Something I find quite interesting is that Oman was one of the very last nations on earth to abolish slavery in 1970. It’s incredible to think that people who actually owned slaves are still alive today. I mention this because perhaps in some way this is linked to how many Omanis view and treat their domestic help, and why they feel the need to have them in the first place. Naturally, slavery is a taboo subject that no one discusses in public here.

I know it’s not fair to generalize because there are plenty of really great employers who treat their labourers as humans. By employing help Omani families are indirectly supporting immediate and extended family members in their employees’ respective countries. However, that does not by any means justify low wages, forced labour, threats, blackmail and confiscation of passports..

Read the full piece here.

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