who wants an indonesian maid ?
I am leaving qatar for good and i have a maid that i would like to leave here and i want QR 10,000 ONLY .
She is very clean and well behaved.
Pay the money and i make NOC .
THAT’S IT
ONLY SERIOUS CALLERS ON 33019471 (Mr Walid )

The poster is literally selling a domestic worker. A “NOC” is a letter of no objection necessary to transfer the sponsorship of a migrant worker to another individual. The common practice of charging exorbitant, profitable fees for transferral is often referred to as the “Maid Trade” and amounts to human trafficking.

The post evidences disturbing practices and attitudes towards domestic workers; employers often perceive maids as “investments,” in part because of high recruitment costs exacerbated by the sponsorship system. These high costs are the primary reason a market exists for the “Maid Trade,” as demonstrated by the “interested and serious” respondent. This commodification of domestic workers necessarily invites abuse as the employment relationship becomes one of ownership rather than an exchange of services. Traditional undervaluation of domestic labor contributes to these denigrating practices.

GCC states continue to reject the sponsorship system’s complicity in trafficking as well as the prevalence of such practices. In the face of criticism, states refer to recurrent documentation as “anecdotal” rather than systematic. How many more such “isolated incidents” must migrant workers experience before Gulf states acknowledge the enduring pattern of exploitation?

One hundred fifteen stranded women overseas Filipino workers in Amman, Jordan today renewed their plea to the PH government to attend on their repatriation, according to Filipino migrant rights group Migrante-Middle East (M-ME).

On April 22, 2013, around 30 of the 115 stranded OFWs, who are supposed to provisionally stay at the Filipino Workers Resource Center (FWRC), run and manage by the Philippine Embassy in Amman, Jordan, went out of the FWRC and staged a picket in front of the Philippine Overseas Labor office and OWWA building (POLO-OWWA) to press PH embassy and labor officials of their long-awaited repatriation. (See photos below).

“Most of the stranded women OFWs have been staying at FWRC in Amman, Jordan since 2010. Their supposed temporary stay at FWRC seems have become permanent amid repeated plea for their repatriation,” said MIGRANTE vice chairperson John Leonard Monterona, also regional coordinator of Migrante International in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).

Monterona said the majority of the 115 stranded women OFWs were victim of human trafficking as confirmed by stranded OFWs during recent exchanges with Monterona.

“Unfortunately after working for several weeks and months, they fall prey to their respective employers’ abuses and maltreatment. Others have not been paid of their salaries for months, while some were falsely charged of stealing and illicit relationship by their employers prompting them to run away from their sponsor-employer,” Monterona revealed.

Monterona cited the case of ‘Marimar’ (not her real name), 37, from Laguna. She falls prey to illegal recruiter and was deployed on January 28, 2010 to Amman, Jordan to work as a household service worker (HSW). She claimed that she was sexually harassed by her employer after two months working for the latter prompting her to run away and sought assistance and refuge to PH embassy and labor officials in Amman.

Marimar has stayed 9 months at the FWRC and sensing there was no development on her case, she was forced to leave at the FWRC but was nabbed by Jordan immigration authorities a week after.

Monterona, citing the stranded women OFWs, said since they run away from their employers and many have no passport as it is usually confiscated by their employer, the PH embassy issued travel documents.

“The problem is that Jordan immigration authorities didn’t honor the travel documents issued by the PH embassy to the stranded OFWs to get out-passes and eventually leave Jordan,” Monterona revealed.

The stranded OFWs were told to report to Jordan immigration office for ‘interview’ on a schedule basis, but this was stop on April 25, 2013 by the Jordan immigration authorities themselves.

“In such case, the PH embassy and labor officials in Jordan should lobby to the Jordan immigration authorities the acceptance of issued travel documents to the 115 stranded OFWs to obtain out-passes,” Monterona suggested.

Monterona, citing humanitarian consideration, calls on the Jordan govt. to relax its immigration rules and accept the PH govt.-issued travel documents to the stranded OFWs, grant them out-passes and let the stranded women OFWs leave Jordan after proper compliance of documentation formalities by the Jordan immigration authorities.

Meanwhile, the stranded OFWs conveyed to Monterona that electricity supply at the FWRC during night is cut off and electric heaters are collected out from their rooms amid cold temperature during night. They also alleged that their cell phones were confiscated.

“We call on the PH embassy and labor officials in Amman, Jordan to respect the rights of the stranded women OFWs staying at the FWRC. They must ensure continuous supply of food, water, medicines, electricity, heaters and other needs of the wards,” Monterona added.

Monterona urges Pres. Aquino III to ask the DFA and DoLE to submit a comprehensive report on the numbers and condition of all distressed OFWs temporarily staying at PH embassy and consulate-run Filipino Workers Resource Centers or Bahay Kalinga.

“PNoy should order the DFA and DoLE to fast track the mass repatriation of all distressed and stranded OFWs staying at PH shelters in the Middle East,” Monterona concluded.

Reference:

John Leonard Monterona
MIGRANTE vice chairperson
Migrante-Middle East regional coordinator
Mobile No. 0063 923 420 0112

Additionally, migrants who work for firms in “red” Nitaqat zones (non-compliant firms) and hold expired iqamas (resident permits) may transfer their sponsorship without first renewing their iqamas. Migrants will no longer need their passports to transfer from red Nitaqat firms. These amendments may limit some mechanisms of forced labor, whereby sponsors withhold the documents necessary to transfer sponsorship. However, individual sponsors may still exploit transfers by illegally charging migrant workers or prospective sponsors.

Unfortunately, Saudi officials have not announced a timeline for these reforms. This ambiguity is concerning as in the past, Saudi has failed to implement similar commitments meant to provide migrants with greater employment mobility. For example, 2011 provisions to permit migrant workers to exchange sponsorship without notifying their sponsors in certain circumstances were never realized. Migrant Rights urges Saudi authorities to ensure the speedy enforcement of these new measures and will monitor their implementation in the coming months.

Migrant Rights also encourages Ministry of Labor officials to adopt more coherent communication conventions in matters relating to Nitaqat. Though the Huroob reform is positive, constantly fluctuating regulations confuses all stakeholders and obstruct compliance.

A number of domestic workers escaped abusive conditions in April. In Bahrain, an Indian worker was forced to work 20-hour days, while enduring undernourishment and underpayment. She was repatriated with the help of Migrants Forum in Asia and India’s National Domestic Workers Movement. In the UAE, several Nepali domestic workers recounted their experiences with abuse: one reported that her employer tied a shoelace around her neck, while another was unpaid for 19 months. In Kuwait, a Filipina worker was deprived of sleep and beaten with steel rods. She was forced to work despite the termination of her contract, only able to finally escape with the aid of neighborhood housemaids and Kuwaiti employers. Arab Times Online published disturbing images of her wounds here. In Saudi, a woman escaped from her employer but was subsequently raped by a driver and his friend.

Some workers attempted to escape by other means; in Kuwait, an Asian maid attempted to overdose on sleeping pills. In the UAE, an Indian laborer committed suicide at a construction site by hanging himself from a scaffold with an electric cord. Elsewhere in the UAE, an Indian man was stabbed by his employer after trying to recapture his passport. A fight between the two broke out after the employer demanded he sign a blank document. Withholding workers’ passports is illegal yet remains widely practiced by sponsors seeking to prevent workers from running away.

Many workers also escaped trafficking conditions. An Indian sub-agent was arrested after holding a worker in Kuwait ransom. Similarly, a Sri Lankan sub-agent in Saudi was arrested after Sri Lankan TV aired footage of him abusing maids in a “safe house.” The women were beaten because they allegedly refused to work for their assigned sponsors. The ILO’s recent report on trafficking noted the prevalent role of subagents in forced labor conditions. In Dubai, five Bangladeshi men who forced a fellow national into prostitution received five years each in prison.

Additionally, thousands of workers remain stranded throughout the region. Over 3500 Filipino workers were camped out near the Jeddah consulate following Saudi’s crackdown on undocumented workers. Saudi recently announced repatriation schemes would begin this week. Over 40 Filipinas in Jordan also remain unemployed and unable to return home. 30 of the women protested in front of the embassy’s shelter to demand repatriation. The women have attempted to obtain repatriation for over a year, and have not been allowed into the overcrowded shelter.

Thousands of stranded Somali and Ethiopian migrants also face severe conditions in Northern Yemen. The UN has published an extensive report on their enduring plight here.

Migrant workers should not be forced to rely on the states or their employer’s particular disposition or mood – they should be incorporated under the same labor and legal codes that governs national workers. Currently, most migrant workers are marginalized under discriminatory labor laws which inherently undervalue their work. For example, the paucity in legal protections for domestic workers perpetuates denigrative attitudes of their labor, which is often conceived as merely an extension of “unproductive” female activities.

Such episodic “acts of kindness” work as propaganda, to boost the public image of states that systematically deny and violate migrant rights. They are then cited to circumvent very much needed labor reforms, including restructuring of the sponsorship system. The sponsorship system entrenches migrant workers’ dependency on employers, rendering them vulnerable to exploitation and abuse.

Such ad-hoc practices fail to guarantee migrants the inalienable rights enshrined in international and regional conventions. With regard to imprisoned migrants, this includes the right to a fair trial, the right to a translator, and the right to accessible legal services. Even more generally, the state transgresses on migrant worker rights by failing to enact or implement protective legislation. Though sporadic pardons and related acts may occasion positive, one-off outcomes, they are no substitute for the legal formalization of migrant rights.

The program’s newly vehement enforcement has cast away a number of Saudi’s obligations identified by Jabarti:

1. The inability to transfer sponsorship easily, which the ILO identified as an indicator of forced labor, despite the Ministry of Labor’s assurance that migrants could transfer from noncompliant companies without the sponsor’s approval.

2. The absence of a wage protection system and emergency 24/7 multilingual hotlines for complaints, guaranteed to be implemented before the end of 2011.

3. The enforcement of Nitaqat at its intended time in 2011, which would have prevented mass deportations and allayed the insecurity migrants and employers currently face.

4. The development an English version of the Nitaqat website in 2011. The website remains available only in Arabic, which the majority of migrant workers cannot read. Workers are largely unaware of how Nitaqat affects their rights and their specific situations.

Moreover, Jabarti urges Saudi employers to recognize their legal and moral obligation to migrant workers.

This grace period is addressed to us. Yes it is down and up to Saudis to ensure the facilitation of this modification and legalization…Can we follow this “grace period” to the “T” making it a true period of grace? A period during which we behave or at least attempt to behave gracefully and cooperatively with guest workers — which would hopefully extend into becoming an official premise? Can we?

Importantly, Jabarti underlines that equitable compensation and treatment of migrant workers is not charity, but rather the employer and the state’s legal and moral mandate. Jabarti’s criticisms joins a number of recent regional editorials condemning the pervasive mistreatment of migrant workers.

Unfortunately, Saudi policies fail to echo this consciousness of employers’ legal and ethical obligations to workers; employers who hire undocumented workers, or who effectively force migrants into illegal work situations, do not face meaningful legal consequences. A significant portion of sponsors illegally charge workers employed with another entity to renew residence documents or circumvent quota policies by either falsely registering current employees as “huroob” (runaways) or registering visas under false sponsors. Saudi recently announced that “individuals or companies registering cover-up business” will incur a five year visa ban in addition to pre-established fines, but such penalties are irregularly enforced. In contrast, migrants are severely criminalized, forced to pay high fees, face imminent deportation, and potential detainment. The disproportionate crackdown on migrant workers reflect the highly imbalanced nature of employment relations under the sponsorship system.

Furthermore, migrants do not have the opportunity to redress employer transgressions. To this point, Jabarti asks:

1. “Will all guest workers having to exit the country be paid all their dues in due time?”

2. “What happens to guest workers whose sponsors have wrongly reported them as “huroob” i.e. runaways? How will this be monitored and rectified?”

Under the current framework, employers are effectively absolved of past dues yet migrants must settle any “pending obligations” to employers; in order to obtain exit, migrants must secure a no-objection certificate (NOC) from employers certifying that contractual obligations were fulfilled. However, employers are not required to prove they have paid all wages to migrant workers – despite the prevalence of underpayment which often constitutes migrants’ initial motivation to abscond. Migrants legal status and mobility are made dependent on employers, a consequence that itself fosters undocumented migration. Additionally, no mechanism exists to ensure that employers do not charge migrants exploitative and illegal fees to obtain the NOC or a transfer of sponsorship (for migrant workers not seeking exit.) Not all migrant workers are in contact with their original employer, compounding the difficulty of obtaining an NOC.

An estimated 1,000 undocumented Filipinos camped out near Jeddah consulate. Image from GMAnetwork.com

Currently, thousands of stranded migrant workers are languishing throughout Saudi; over 1,000 Filipino migrants are camped outside of a Filipino embassy while 6,000 Sri Lankans took cover under a Jeddah nearby bridge. The Philippines has called on Saudi to waive these requirements, the NOC in particular, in order to expedite the return of these workers. The Indian Embassy has established a hotline to help migrant workers (No. 059681057), an initiative which should be replicated by other representative entities. Origin countries must also allocate more funding to embassies to expediently process the massive influx of exit requests and aid migrants seeking to correct their papers.

Jabarti’s piece holds that migrants should enjoy rights to more than “time” to resolve their status. Saudi must uphold its obligations to protect migrant workers from further exploitation by ensuring both regular and irregular migrants have access to legal recourse to equitably settle issues with employers. In accordance with international norms, the Saudi government should also provide an opportunity for undocumented migrants to appeal illegal residency status and to avoid mass deportation schemes. Additionally, the psychological impact on migrants uncertain of the conditions or penalties they will face if detained obliges Saudi to disseminate clear, standardized procedures for Nitaqat violators. Coordination between the Saudi government and sending-country embassies is critical to allaying further transgressions of migrants’ inalienable rights.

*Nitiqat primarily affects migrants who no longer work for their original sponsor and have failed to transfer sponsorship. However, undocumented migrant workers who have absconded from their employers or overstayed their visas and now reside in Saudi illegally are inevitably targeted in labor camp raids or office inspections.

“…of the 359 workers interviewed for the report, 266 were considered as possible trafficking cases. In that case… 80 per cent of the labour market in the UAE may have been trafficked – which was obviously not the case. “

The report clearly specified that its findings could not be statistically extrapolated to the region. However, both the content and volume of the anecdotes indicate that systemic issues within the GCC, including the sponsorship and lax regulation, entrench pervasive forced labour situations. The report also urged sending and receiving governments to expand efforts to provide quantitative data to facilitate further analysis of trafficking in the region.

2. “The report relied only on 65 key witnesses and 61 migrant workers”

The report examined the entire scope of the trafficking phenomenon, which entailed interviews with all relevant of stakeholders including: migrants, government officials, NGOs, and recruitment agents. The diversity of stakeholders spanning the pre-departure, departure, and arrival phases is essential to a comprehensive understanding of the phenomenon of trafficking migrants for forced labor and prostitution. The supposedly small number of cases reviewed in the report cannot be dismissed as mere “instances” of trafficking given a) the ILO’s analysis of the structural forces that induce and perpetuate such situations and b) the sheer volume and recurrence of similar reports.

3. “Everyone at work has problems.”

This flippant assertion trivializes the plight of migrant workers and other victims of trafficking, falsely drawing a comparison between the mundane struggles of ‘white-collar’ workers to those faced by socially and legally marginalized individuals. The issues discussed in the report – nonpayment, physical sexual, or psychological abuse, underpayment, and dangerous or exacting working conditions – are not endured equally across demographics in the UAE nor the wider GCC. This claim attempts to deflect government complicity in such conditions and furthermore derogates violations of international human rights conventions, including including those espoused in the Arab Human Rights Charter.

The following assertions further attempted to dispel the report’s criticisms:

1. “There were safeguards for workers who felt they had been exploited, channels for them to voice grievances, and that the law looked after any victims of the system.”

The report indicated that there was a) a paucity in such safeguards b) a lack of enforcement, regulation, or monitoring of such safeguards and c) other accessibility issues to such safeguards; many of these obstructions are intrinsic to the sponsorship system as the system renders leaving or complaining about an employer extremely precarious to a migrant’s residency. The framework of sponsorship operates on an unequal relationship between employers and migrants, inherently prioritizing the rights of the former. Furthermore, Migrant Rights receives numerous reports of migrants unable to obtain aid from either GCC governments or their own representatives in remedying exploitative situations.

The report urged GCC nations to amplify regulation of scrupulous recruitment agencies, to implement monitoring schemes of households to ensure the protection of domestic workers, and to reform the sponsorship by empowering the role of labour ministries a more central role in the migration system.

2.“A number of intrinsic rights to workers, and he stressed that holding on to passports was illegal.”

This statement merely reinforces that the sponsorship system and the concurrent lack of effective regulation undermines any existing labor protections for migrant workers. That passport confiscation continues – even in major companies such as the Sharjah Free Zone – furthermore demonstrates the absence of substantive enforcement mechanisms necessary to render existing protections effective.

3. “Each country has a right to adopt whatever system it deems suitable,”

With the release of the Committee’s 2012-2013 report, officials relayed commitments to “maintain a constructive dialogue with all the members of the international community to eliminate human trafficking.” However, “constructive dialogue” is circumscribed when such international efforts are repeatedly dismissed as challenges to sovereignty.

4. “If the matter reached exploitation, no doubt the human-trafficking law would protect and punish accordingly,” he said.

Many of the reforms suggested in the report are intended to prevent exploitation. Furthermore, the report documented systematic obstructions to legal resolutions, including issues of accessibility to legal services and psychological impediments to reporting employers; or example, some sponsors threaten workers that complain or escape with imprisonment and deportation – a reality that prevents many migrants from leaving and reporting exploitative conditions. In one case, a domestic worker who escaped abusive working conditions was imprisoned in an immigration holding prison and deported after sponsor’s claimed she absconded.

5. “These people [who are sexually exploited] are afraid, they feel if they complain they will face prison. This is not true,” he said. “The victim is a victim, not a criminal. The law … is very clear, they are a victim. They go to the shelter, not to court, unless there is a case. The victim never accused.”

Unfortunately, several cases in the UAE specifically evidence that the threat of imprisonment and deportation felt by victims is strongly grounded in reality. In one case, a Filipina domestic worker worker was jailed for adultery. The judgement was ascertained largely because the worker lacked a representative during her trial. In 2012, a British expatriate who reported a rape was instead fined for drinking. In another case, a domestic worker was raped by her sponsor’s son and locked up for the duration of her resulting pregnancy. She was then jailed for participating in an “illicit relationship.”

6.“The report did not differentiate between exploitation of workers and contractual problems.”

In many cases, contractual issues comprises a conduit for exploitation – the two are not independent of one another.

One of officials’ few prudent suggestions included the need for bilateral and multilateral policy coherence. Many exploitative practices, contract substitution in particular, are facilitated and amplified by differential labor policies or enforcement schemes in sending and origin countries.

However, the generally obdurate perspectives related by UAE officials indicate an unwillingness to acknowledge not only the need for extensive policy reform, but even more generally the reality of the region’s pervasive exploitation of migrant workers. Though the Committee recently announced a new 2013 initiative to expand awareness of trafficking in airports and more generally to “take forward its programmes on combating human trafficking,” such efforts are fragmentary at best; the failure to address regulatory factors that facilitate trafficking throughout the duration of the migration process, as well as the failure to acknowledge the various manifestations of forced labor, subverts the capacity for effective resolutions.

The ILO’s First Regional Conference on Human Trafficking in the Arab Region concluded Wednesday, in Amman, Jordan. The conference and accompanying report discussed the concurrence of human trafficking and forced labour of migrant workers, and recommended a number of practices to improve anti-trafficking efforts as well as the wider migration system. The report focused on the prevalence of forced labour in domestic work, the sex industry, and intensive labour occupations including agriculture, fishing, construction and animal herding. Field interviews were conducted in Jordan, Lebanon, Kuwait, and the UAE, but interviewees included migrants and nationals from across Middle East, as well as individuals based in origin countries.

The ILO estimates that 600,000 migrant workers – 3.4 in every 1,000 of the regions inhabitants – are compelled to work against their free choice. Though other regions including Central and Southeastern Europe experience much greater rates of forced labor, the Arab region’s vast scale of migration in conjunction with the inherently exploitative nature of the sponsorship uniquely and systematically fosters forced labour situations.

Specifically, the ILO noted the that following facets and consequences of the sponsorship system entrench forced labour situations:

The sponsorship system itself is embedded in the specific indicators used to determine trafficking and forced labor incidents. These indicators varied slightly between the assessed occupations, but in general included:

1. Recruitment by deception – can include deception regarding the nature or conditions of work, and be intentionally or unintentionally exacted by recruitment agents, family, friends, or employers. Deceptive recruitment also includes the recruitment of individuals for non-existent jobs.

For example, domestic workers are often unaware that their responsibilities may include nannying in addition to looking after the house, and are overwhelmed by their employers’ unrealistic expectations. The toll taken on workers can be extreme – last December, a domestic worker in Kuwait committed suicide after her sponsor berated her for neglecting her children.

2. Work and life under duress – can include forced overtime, limited freedom of movement, degrading living and working conditions, denunciation to authorities, physical, psychological threats or violence, confinement, constant surveillance, lack of rest periods, isolation, and restrictions on communication.

For example, domestic workers are regularly confined to their employer’s residents, do not enjoy rest days, and work over 10 hours a day. Labourers often endure hazardous living conditions, with several men sharing a single room that lacks basic amenities; In Bahrain, numerous labor camp fires have taken the lives of migrant workers. Unsafe working conditions, particularly with building scaffolding, are also prevalent throughout the region. HRW’s report on the UAE’s ‘Saadiyat’ islands documents the pervasiveness of unsafe or otherwise difficult working conditions even amongst major, conspicuous projects.

3. Inability to leave employer (due to threat or penalty) – includes consequences and facets of the sponsorship system, such as the inability to change employers, sponsor’s ability to refuse the release of workers or charge high release fees, as well as sponsor’s ability to withhold wages and personal travel documents to prevent workers from running away. Exorbitant and illegal recruitment fees can also prevent indebted migrants from leaving unfavorable employment situations.

Individual sponsors and numerous leading firms continue to confiscate employees’ documents to “protect” their investment from leaving the country or escaping to another employer. In a recent case disclosed to Migrant Rights, a sponsor required her domestic worker to pay 600 dirhams for her release to another employer, and thereafter prevented the worker from obtaining other employment. The worker escaped to her agency, but was told to return because her employ was rich, and because her embassy would not intervene on her behalf. The worker remains in limbo in a Dubai-based recruitment agency, with no security for remuneration or for future employment.

The ILO also noted a number of other regional patterns that enable trafficking and forced labour conditions:

The ILO’s recommendations to regional governments and service providers included:

Improving prevention mechanisms:

[Download the ILO's full report here.]

The participation of over 100 delegates from the Arab region may indicate that some foundation and inclination for substantive reform to the migration system and to anti-trafficking laws does exist. Over the past years, the ILO’s collaboration with Jordan and Lebanon has procured tangible gains for migrant workers; the prospect for technical expertise to continue assisting these nations and the wider Mideast is a promising sign for the future of migrant rights.

Recent reports evidence that migrant workers are subject to indefinite detainment in squalid living conditions, and receive minimal support from state representatives. Officials should avoid detaining undocumented migrants en masse but should ensure humane detention where detention is absolutely necessary. According to Article 22(4) of the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families (ICRMW), migrants have the right to contest expulsion under the review of the competent authority. Sending nation embassies must also monitor the treatment of detained citizens and provide free, accessible legal support where possible.

GCC governments must also consider the conditions which preceded undocumented situations. Migrants should be allowed to redress any negative employment conditions which may have prompted them to seek employment with an entity other than their original sponsor. Articles 22(6) and 22(9) of the ICRMW proscribe the interference of deportation in “any wages or entitlements due to a migrants.” Sending-nation embassies and consulates should provide staff and services to aid migrants in reconciling issues with nonpayment prior to eminent deportations.

Moreover, GCC nations should reconsider the use of crackdowns and deportations for normative, economic, and strategic benefits; as an alternative, migrants should be granted an amnesty period that allows them to transfer their sponsorship without excessive fees or penalty. This would enable workers to access protections of existing legislation, while also allowing states to more accurately gauge the number of migrants within its borders1.

Migrant Rights encourages the GCC nations to recognize:

1. that the constraints of the stringent sponsorship system on both employers and migrants fosters undocumented employment situations. From a rights-based perspective, mass deportations contravene basic human rights standards. In particular, collective deportations that fail to review individual cases violate article 26(2) of Arab Charter on Human Rights. Deportations disproportionately criminalize and penalize migrant workers, despite the mutual involvement of employers in such undocumented work schemes. Undocumented migrants are subjected to a protracted state of fear and confusion, unaware if their labor camps or workplaces will be raided, and unaware of the rights they possess in such cases or in case of detention. Gulf governments have not made public or accessible standard procedures of raids or deportations, nor have they stipulated the rights or obligation to the rights of undocumented workers in such cases. Undocumented or irregular migrant workers are entitled to such rights regardless of the particular circumstances, but GCC nations should be particularly assiduous in ensuring migrants’ rights given the sponsorship system’s complicity in engendering such “illegal” work conditions.

States should also dedicate resources to inspecting working and housing conditions at least commensurate with the resources allocated to raids and detentions. Such regulation would proactively curb undocumented work situations by curtailing several of its primary causes. As Migrant Rights encouraged in a previous report, states must address the structural causes undocumented migration in order to effectively address this phenomenon.

2. The economic disadvantages of such intensive crackdowns should prompt the GCC to consider alternative, more efficient mechanisms to curb illegal migration. Rapid, mass deportations unpredictably drains the workforce without substitution. Many undocumented migrants work as laborers, service workers, or other low-wage occupations that nationalization schemes do not or cannot target. In the past, mass raids have had deleterious effects even on sectors of the economy maintained by nationals; for example, in 2010, Oman’s mass deportations severely undermined Muscat’s taxi services, which predominantly served migrant workers that could not afford vehicles. Omani drivers reported massive reductions in earnings, and many faced difficulty obtaining other work to compensate their losses. Deportations of illegal workers consequently had a negative impact on national employment, as the taxi enterprise represented one of few occupations accessible to older nationals who lacked an education or trade.

Contemporarily, Saudi firms have already voiced their distress with the eminent yet simultaneously unpredictable trajectory of the raids and deportations. One manager noted,

“We have huge projects worth billions in construction, and taking this action and deporting illegal workers, I think it’s going to reflect on the infrastructure. I’m sure a lot of projects will suffer,” said Mr Al Khathlan. “There is already a shortage of labour.” [Quoted in The National UAE]

Saudi and wider GCC attempts to “jump-start” nationalization by forcibly removing a large portion of the non-national workforce in the last decade have repeatedly failed; rather than invigorating national employment, deporting undocumented workers (or individuals working for their non-original sponsor) forces firms to operate with a reduced work-force in sectors unattractive to locals. Once raids and inspections subside, undocumented and unsponsored migration resumes as the structural incentives remain intact. Consequently, mass deportations have minimal long-term effect on the scale of either illegal or or non-national workforces while simultaneously incapacitating economic sectors. The inefficiency of such intermittent actions – in part due to the anticipation of such fluctuations by employers and migrants alike – furthermore squanders valuable state resources.

The GCC must recognize that economically advantageous policies can still be pursued through a rights-based approach. Nationalization plans must be implemented with respect for both migrant and employer rights, and in accordance with international norms. In the meantime, sending nations must deploy all necessary resources to facilitate the timely repatriation of stranded migrants, and to ensure the wellbeing of all overseas citizens.

1. Amnesty periods that allow workers to return home without penalty are important, but must be conducted with great care. Amnesty periods must be long enough to allow sending-nations to maneuver the significant resources necessary to repatriate a large number of migrants. Sending nations must also be careful not to impose unnecessary barriers or delays, which may appear in the form of ticket pricing and exit-visa processing. Such obstructions prevented thousands of Indian nationals from obtaining repatriation during the UAE’s 2012-13 amnesty period. Migrants unable to take advantage of amnesty periods were thereafter pursued and indefinitely detained. Even during active amnesty periods, not all migrants are free from penalties; In the UAE, several women were jailed with their children for “adultery, sex outside marriage and having illegitimate children” when they attempted to seek repatriation. Other migrants avoid amnesty repatriations in fear of life-bans from GCC nations.

References:
International Bill of Migrant Rights
International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families
Arab Charter on Human Rights