Working to improve the lot of house servants in the UAE

BBC

Sharla, a US national married to a UAE national

I run the City of Hope, which is a shelter for battered women. We've dealt with about 400 victims in the past six months.

I think the United Arab Emirate is really trying to improve the situation for housemaids.

They are working with Sri Lanka and the Philippines to crack down on the problems.

Currently, the biggest issue is with Ethiopians. Traffickers are going to the most remote villages in Ethiopia and tricking these women into coming here. Their families pay the traffickers up to a thousand dollars to send them to work in Dubai.

They then put them in these villas. The women are completely illiterate, completely overwhelmed and they can't cope, so they run away. We sent more than a hundred victims back to Ethiopia in July and August alone.

I have had a positive experience with the authorities here, although at a lower level I go through a lot of harassment. If you're any type of victim, your first point of contact is with the lower level police, which is not fun.

One maid for every child

Gulf News

Five per cent of the population of the UAE are domestic workers, according to a new study by the Abu Dhabi Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
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Abu Dhabi: Mohammad Al Saeedi has four housemaids, one for each of his children.
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Al Saeedi affirms the study's findings by saying, "I know countless families who have more maids than there are people in the house."
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26-year-old Mohammad Al Ganabi says this idea has to change. "It is actually not healthy to the structure of the family to have these many housemaids.

Besides housemaids other there are other categories of domestic workers such as chauffeurs.

It is not only Emirati families that employ domestics. Many middle and upper class ex pat families employ live-in domestics as well. Still, 5% is substantial in a country where less than 30% of the population are citizens and most of the 70% ex pats are low wage workers.

Permanent Committee for Monitoring the UAE's Image Abroad

Gulf News

The Cabinet has set up a taskforce to draft a law to regulate the relationship between domestic workers and their sponsors. The proposed law will ensure rights and duties of both sides are guaranteed, WAM reported.
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Dr Anwar Gargash UAE, Minster of State for Federal National Council Affairs, praised the Cabinet move. "We are fully aware in the UAE of the need to improve the situation of domestic workers and have been working systematically towards that goal," he told Gulf News yesterday. He described the decision as a major step.

Dr Gargash, who is also Chairman of the Permanent Committee for Monitoring the UAE's Image Abroad, added the move was an important milestone in protecting the rights of domestic workers in line with national and international standards.
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The UAE Human Rights Organisation has provided recommendations on a number of issues concerning the contract regulating the relationship between domestic helpers and their employers.

• The contract should provide for a minimum wage because low salary is a major reason why a domestic helper absconds from her or his sponsor.
• Minimum working hours and specific duties for each job.
• System to transfer wages to banks regularly and on time.
• Proper accommodation which ensures privacy is observed.
• Specific daily working hours and weekly rest.
• Equal annual leave as compared to other workers.
• Providing a hotline to receive complaints from domestic workers against any abuses.
• Contract to be translated into languages known by domestic helpers.

Sheik Mohammed presents UAE development plan

The International Herald Tribune reports:

One of the United Arab Emirates top leaders urged the country's citizens on Tuesday to stop relying on government handouts and reduce number of foreign workers, who he said threaten national security.

During a speech, Dubai leader Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum outlined a strategy that he said would make the Emirates one of the world's most developed countries — just days after The World Economic Forum identified the Gulf country the as the Arab world's most competitive economy.

His strategy called for major improvements in the country's educational and justice systems as well as reducing the dominant foreign work force that, Sheik Mohammed said, discourages Emirati citizens from taking private sector jobs.

Sheik Mohammed, who was named federal prime minister and vice president last year, said he would personally oversee the country's work force. He put the ministers of Justice, Education, Health and Labor on notice that their jobs depended on meeting his goals for improvements and their ministries would be benchmarked against international best practices.
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The speech seemed to give the dynamic Sheik Mohammed a broader role in federal affairs, overshadowing the country's head of state, Sheik Khalifa, who sat in the audience. Sheik Mohammed called for more integration of the autonomous emirates with the federal government in Abu Dhabi, the wealthiest of the seven.

Sheik Mohammed said he wanted to reduce foreign labor and influences in a country where some 85 percent of the country's 5 million population is foreign, while moving citizens into the private sector's top posts.

He called for an immediate end to foreign labor in "marginal economic activities" and described the 300,000 illegal laborers in the country as a national security threat.

At the same time, he chastised Emirati families for hiring too many maids and domestic servants — which form 10 percent of the labor force.

"The number of domestic helpers in some families exceeds the size of the family itself," he said. "Most families maintain a number of domestic help which is beyond their actual need."

Too many able-bodied Emiratis are living off government handouts, he added.

The Gulf News coverage is here. Additional coverage by GN:

A balanced diet for sustainable growth
Call for cautious Emiratisation
Abdullah: Strategy not set in stone

Khaleej Times reports:

Shaikh Mohammed unveils federal government strategy
Khalifa lauds new strategy
Bring on the future, here’s the master plan...
Cabinet reshuffle ruled out

The Runaway Maid

Or, Of Human Bondage, albeit voluntary servitude.

Secret Dubai has a better solution.