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Domestic Migrant Workers in Lebanon
Lebanon is home to more than 250.000 migrants (mostly women) that work in the domestic service sector, a sector that is known for doing the household such as cooking and cleaning, but also supporting families with raising their family. The domestic service sector has a lot of problems that are mostly caused by the problematic framework it is built on; the Kafala system. This system gives employers the upper hand compared to the employee. As a result, significant amounts of domestic workers are exploited and abused. The migrants are in a difficult position as they are dependable on their employer, and other people are dependable on their remittances, the money the migrant workers send back to their home country.

Migrant workers are very common in Lebanon as they are the successor of an earlier habit of the Lebanese state: domestic slavery. This practice was very common in Lebanon when they were reigned by the Ottoman empire. Slaves were imported from either the Krim or from Africa to serve as a domestic worker. After the fall of this empire and the successive take-over by the French, Slavery was eventually abolished only in 1932. “Slaves” however were still needed, which resulted in the introduction of the Kafala system, a framework that provides multiple Middle Eastern countries with plenty of human labour sources working for them under deplorable conditions while simultaneously being heavily restrained in their freedom.

The Kafala system [Do not forget the Ethiopian article]

The Kafala system is the foundation of the suppression of migrant workers in Lebanon. Originally the system was used a social mechanism. Through this system, foreign people that want to become a domestic worker in this country do need a sponsor (kafeel) to come to the country. These sponsors are found in a process where an agency is mediating in return for a remuneration. After the contract is worked out, the migrants will fly over from their main country to Lebanon. At arrival at the start of their work, migrants are often (illegally) obliged to hand in their passport and other important documents to their sponsor who has now full control over the freedom of movement of the migrant. The migrant workers fulfill tasks in and around the house to support the sponsor in return for a salary of approximately …. This payment is mostly sent back as a remittance to the home country to support other family members.

Injustice in the Kafala system

Due to the form of the Kafala system migrants do have significant disadvantage in potential negotiations and disputes. This problem arises from a special legal characteristic of the Kafala system: the migrant is only legal in the country as long as he or she has a sponsor contract with an employer. As soon as the employer or the employee ends the contract, the migrant is forced to leave the country. This disadvantage can lead to very poignant cases. Migrant workers report multiple forms of offenses and violations: being beaten, being locked up in the home, not allowed to keep in contact with family members, delayed salary payments and the denial of enough rest. Failure to fulfill the set tasks can already result in a change in the migrant status, thereby triggering a potential arrest and subsequent deportation.

International Critique

Lebanon has received a lot of international critique on its Kafala system as it promotes inequality and abuse of the system, but also the fact that Lebanon is unwilling to make changes to the system to ensure a better protection of the migrant workers. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International both have published reports that document the bad conditions that migrants have the work under. Human Rights Watch shows that in cases where migrant workers fled or went to court against their sponsor for relational problems, the court took his time to answer. Furthermore, not having access to your own passport was not seen as a problem in the Lebanese justice system. On the contrary however when the sponsor sues the migrant worker for suspicions of law violations, migrant workers were detained much quicker even if they were found guilty eventually. MDW’s experience a similar experience if they would go to the police. That organization seems to be rather at hand of the sponsors than of the workers and fails to listen to the problems of the migrants.

Amnesty International mentions the bad conditions and also highlights the problems that arise with the agencies that are used to find an employee for a sponsor. These agencies sometimes fall prey to malpractices and sometimes take higher remuneration than they are allowed to take. “One recruitment agency representative interviewed by Amnesty International referred to workers as commodities and explained how recruitment fees increase if there is a ban.” The perception of people as commodities also lead to a perspective where workers are replaceable: they can be replaced by other resources.

Domestic worker home country responses

As a result of the bad circumstances foreign nationals have to work in Lebanon, multiple countries (Including Ethiopia, Nepal and the Philippines) have proclaimed to forbid their people to work as a migrant worker in Lebanon until the labour issues are solved. As a result, it is more difficult to get migrant workers from these countries as they have to be brought in illegally with a detour. This has led to an increase in prices and fees for the agency firms that recruit the migrants.

Lebanon Government Response

The government is of Lebanon is not a good handler of malpractices in its domestic migrant worker sector. The requirements to start searching for a migrant worker are also to low: only a deposit of around 1000 dollars Is needed. The deposit is needed to pay for the return ticket if the migrant worker would go home. Illegal migrants are also still active in the country even though they should be deported out of the country if they do not have a sponsor anymore. The government is also severely blamed for a lack of control over the agencies that are available in the sector as this is the place of exploitation.

Statistics

What sort of people want a migrant worker?

As Lebanon does have a history of hiring migrant workers, characteristics are similar of the people that hire them: most people do have a university degree and are married. Religion does not matter for the tendency to hire a DMW. There is a small tendency to have larger likeliness to have a migrant worker in the household when the household is larger. Income does not necessarily matter as long as it is higher than the minimum need of 1000 dollars for a household income.

Characteristics of the migrant workers

Migrants can be divided in two groups of origin roughly spoken: they either come from Asia (more specifically the Philipines, Malaysia, Thailand or Sri Linka) or from Africa (Ethiopia, Nigeria, etc) Furthermore migrant workers are young, according to the ILO research the largest part of the MDW workers are younger than 30 years.