A new report has revealed details about the suffering of Kenyan migrant workers in the Middle East, including sex slavery.
The report by the National Assembly Labor and Social Welfare Committee indicates that at least 89 Kenyans have died in Saudi Arabia since 2019, 200 detained in deportation camps while six were hospitalized.
The committee blames local recruitment agencies for the suffering of Kenyans working in Gulf states even as it emerged that most of the agencies are owned by senior government officials, among them MPs.
Members of the committee spoke in Mombasa on Friday during a meeting on the welfare of Kenyan migrant domestic workers which was attended by Labor Cabinet Secretary Simon Chelugui and other stakeholders.
“Our girls cannot continue to be enslaved and suffer in the Middle East. Some are forced to become sex slaves. We met a Kenyan who has been hospitalized for six years. This is a serious issue,” said Mwea MP Wachira Kabinga, who chairs the committee.
“There are 700 recruitment agencies and 500 brokers in Kenya and we also realized 90 percent of Kenyan girls (in the Middle East) have undergone sexual abuse.”
They want parliament to take action against rogue recruiters, arguing that the government cannot put the lives of its citizens at risk for the sake of diaspora remittances.
“This is a serious issue that, if handled well, can be beneficial to us in dealing with employment and earning a lot of foreign exchange. We have had sleepless nights because our people are calling every day narrating their problems. Nearly 90 percent of Kenyans have confessed going through sexual harassment by their employer,” Kabinga said.
The committee also wants the government to ban private agencies and take charge of labor export.
“We are sleeping as a country and we have a huge unemployment crisis. We should work on the recruitment agencies. The government should invest in labor export and stop this modern-day slavery,” nominated MP Wilson Sossion said.
“What we have discovered is that most of the recruitment agencies are owned by individuals in the ministries and government offices.”
On his part, CS Chelugui said a government delegation is scheduled to visit Saudi Arabia to address the plight of Kenyans working there.
“We want the basic human rights of Kenyans to be protected. When we travel to Saudi we will know what killed our people, although we were told it was due to heart attacks and accidents, among other challenges, when we travel we will talk to their labor ministry to unearth the matter,” he said.
It’s of great importance for…
It’s of great importance for the government to set up an office with the ministry of labour for the sore work of recruitment and deployment to the middle East and abraod since we also encounter many cornmen in the field
“…most of the agencies are…
“…most of the agencies are owned by senior government officials, among them MPs.”
NO WONDER this filth has taken forever to fix, with the stamp of the same Mpigs on it. Shame on you MPs who own these agencies. They should be named, shamed and fined heavily for enslaving the poor citizenry that apparently elects the same warthogs. Bure kabisa!
When you license these rogue…
When you license these rogue agencies what do you expect?. When you start holding the agencies and those who own these agencies accountable that problem will end. An agency should be required to know and keep a record of where the people are that they recruited. Edit them frequently to make sure they are staying abreast. If an edit reveals that the agency has no crew where the people are. Revoke their license and fine them. Let us quite selling our people short let us protect our assets.
Arrest all those slaves…
Arrest all those slaves trader aka agencies. As long as they are benefiting from selling our girls to middle east nothing will change.
Samoei Arap Ruto:
Stop…
Samoei Arap Ruto:
Stop bribing the crooked church leaders with our national money and instead use it to create employment for our helpless and desperate youth in our nation.
This slavery has been going…
This slavery has been going on too long.We need action,not just talk.Lives have been lost,and more could be lost unnecessarily if no corrective action is taken.
Please name these Mpigs who own these slave-agencies,and lets shame them,at least,and kick them out come 2022.
Now that your report confirms what many have known for long,what is next?
A short cut to ending legal…
A short cut to ending legal govt backed neo Arab slave trade into Muslim world is for Africa leaders to 1st hate slave trade with a passion then outlaw it and grow the economy. But what they do, they are sharing pornography in parliament instead of helping the electorate.