There exists a double-edged sword as pertains migration of Kenyan labourers to the gulf state, with widespread worry that the benefits do not match the harm caused.
On one hand, Kenya’s youth unemployment of 34.2%, leading to the emigration of young Kenyans in pursuit of employment opportunities coincides with Saudi Arabia’s dependency on foreign labour.
On the other hand, there are large-scale reports of worker abuse in Saudi Arabia, with a 2022 ombudsman report; Systemic Investigation into the plight of Kenyan Migrant Domestic Workers in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, finding instances of passport confiscation, physical abuse, sexual abuse, sleep deprivation, food deprivation, labour exploitation, imprisonment prior to deportation, religious intolerance and psychological abuse.
Why Kenyan workers migrate to Saudi Arabia
Kenya’s youth population (18 to 34 years old) constitutes 29% of the country’s population (KPHC, 2019) and an unemployment rate of 5.7% (World Bank, 2021), indicative of a large youth bulge in Kenya and a subsequent oversupply in the labour market.
As a result of this lack of opportunity, many young Kenyans seek opportunities abroad, with Saudi Arabia absorbing 80,000 domestic workers in 2022 alone.
According to labour economist Dr. Mdoe Idi Jackson, “this is a golden opportunity to help Kenya deal with its youth demographic dividend. We have overshot our labour needs and need to export our excess labour.”
Additionally, there are macroeconomic benefits that have incentivised the Kenyan government to ensure continuous recruitment of Kenyan workers to Saudi Arabia i.e. remittances to Kenya from Saudi Arabia increased to USD 302.26 million in 2022 from USD 185.01 million in 2021; the biggest driver of growth in remittances into the country last year.
Worker abuses: Reasons and Excuses
Despite the economic benefits of this worker emigration, it is imperative to acknowledge the widespread reports of worker abuse. While private recruitment agencies blame worker mistreatment on their being “indisciplined”, former Labour Cabinet Secretary Simon Chelugui claimed that only 40 per cent of private recruitment agencies are registered with the National Employment Authority and therefore remain in the “underworld” with the 2022 Ombudsman report indicating multiple challenges faced by the National Employment Authority (NEA) to achieve more registration of private employment agencies, including submission of fake documents by Kenyan private employment agencies, which also hire offices for the purposes of NEA inspections before giving them back, rendering them untraceable.
There are also reports of interference by politicians who, similar to foreigners, use proxies to open and operate recruitment agencies.
Read: Kenyans Are To Blame For Their Ordeals In The Gulf -PS Macharia
A motion by the Kenyan Senate gave reasons for the plight of Kenyan workers in the Middle East staffing shortages and inadequate funding faced by the labour attaches in Saudi Arabia which hinder the effective supervision of migrant workers in distress, lack of safe houses among others.
Despite this, the Kenyan Ministry of Foreign affairs has claimed that the conditions of Kenyan migrant workers in Saudi Arabia have been misreported and that mistreated workers are those who abandon their contracts and enter the black market.
What should be done
“We need to seek formal systems of labour migration to ensure that Kenyans who go to work in Saudi Arabia can be free agents in the country,” said Dr. Mdoe, “there should be no difference in the migration process for a highly skilled Kenyan migrant worker and a Kenyan migrating (to Saudi Arabia) to perform domestic care.”
This aligns with widespread calls for the establishment of policy and legal frameworks for the migration of Kenyan workers to Saudi Arabia as the Ombudsman report found that the government of Kenya and the Saudi government have not implemented many conditions under the 2016 Bilateral Labour Agreement.
These new policies and legal frameworks would provide an alternative to the kafala system, practised in Saudi Arabia, which gives employers complete authority over whether a worker can transfer jobs, end employment or exit the host country, thus ensuring Kenyan migrant workers can be free agents in Saudi Arabia.
With regards to plans to build two safe houses in Saudi Arabia, Dr. Mdoe insisted that there need to be more of these facilities, saying, “Yes, we do need to establish safe houses, but we need to build more.
Saudi Arabia is a big country, the size of Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and parts of Somalia. You can imagine being in the depths of Tanzania and being told to go to a safe house in Nairobi, it doesn’t make sense.”
As Nairobi eyes a novel labour deal with Riyadh, Kenyans are left to observe on whether the policy framework will encompass protection for the thousands of Kenyan migrant workers in the gulf state and whether, this time round, the provisions related to this crucial aspect of the agreement will be implemented.
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