Investigation: Foreign workers in the UAE between slavery and human trafficking

Abu Dhabi’s failure to protect labour in the UAE exacerbated foreign workers, subjecting them to slavery and human trafficking.

Domestic workers in the UAE are still forced to work around the clock, carrying more duties than usual.

Exploitation in homes was reflected and escalated with the adverse effects of the pandemic on the employment sector when the ban on new recruitment was imposed. Employment offices were closed for a long time, thus reviving the black market for domestic workers.

Domestic workers differ from other foreign workers because they are excluded from the labour law for the private sector and are covered by a weaker law, the Domestic Workers Law.

The majority of domestic workers in the UAE are females who work as domestic workers, babysitters and cooks and reside in the employer’s home, as they are legally obligated to do so.

Their adequate recruitment costs, e.g. low wages, and the lack of public welfare homes, have resulted in a heavy reliance on domestic workers.

The most common channel for recruiting domestic workers to the UAE is through recruitment agencies, which facilitate the arrival and recruitment of domestic workers.

The demand for domestic workers in the UAE is high, which created a black market and revived it. Unregistered agencies took control of matters, which led to the exploitation of thousands of domestic workers, primarily females, by employment agencies.

Domestic workers in the UAE complain directly about illegal practices, especially that unregistered agencies set up offices for their work in apartments and use these apartments to house women before they are delivered to the employer.

Sometimes 50 to 100 domestic workers are placed in one apartment. Little is known about the health problems they faced during the Corona pandemic, all of them crowded into small spaces without access to health care.

These offices operate openly as if they were legal entities. These employment offices promote their services through various social media platforms.

While the client shows interest and completes the contract procedures, the agency presents him with a forged receipt, giving the impression that the transaction is legitimate.

According to workers in the UAE, these illegal offices mainly target domestic workers whose residency permits have expired.

Although the entire process is arduous and traumatic, some domestic workers accept and guarantee work because they earn more than working through regular employment.

Working for more than 12 terms is not only illegal in Kuwait’s Domestic Workers Affairs Law but is also against the ILO Convention of 2011. Although this is required by law, many domestic workers did not get the weekend.

Although by law, domestic workers must work for one sponsor and live with the family in their home, many domestic workers are independent, self-employed for different people.

Workers may see this as a risk worth considering because they can live within their communities and control their working hours. However, the closure, which severely affected the workers’ places, made it impossible for many to go to work.

Human rights organizations call on the UAE to stop the violations of forced labour and human trafficking that domestic workers are exposed to and lift the ban on the recruitment of domestic workers from some countries, which leads to illegal recruitment.

Human rights circles highlight that the UAE is the most racist country towards migrant workers, mainly from African countries, according to Abu Dhabi’s black human rights record.

The International Center for Justice and Human Rights warned that the UAE authorities launched a massive campaign in 2021 to deport at least 375 African foreign workers in racist targeting.

The centre stated that they were arrested and stripped of their personal belongings, dignity, and other numerous human rights violations before being deported en masse and illegally.