UPDATES TO KAFALA
The definitive place to get the latest updates on Kafala.
December 14, 2020 | English
When speaking on municipalism in Lebanon, Beirut Madinati often comes to the fore as the model of grassroots organizing. Beirut Madinati came to fruition in the aftermath of mass protests against the garbage crisis of 2015 that saw the collapse of the waste management infrastructure at the hands of corrupt politicians. The campaign carried the calls of the You Stink protesters and established an electoral campaign to run in the municipal elections of 2016. The campaign was composed of academics, activists, and professionals who sought to unseat the entrenched municipal officials in Beirut.
December 9, 2020 | English
For many years, domestic workers in Lebanon have had an up-close-and-personal experience with a faulty system that the country’s economic collapse has now laid bare
December 7, 2020 | English
Lebanon’s sprawling kafala industry has endured a year to forget. For decades, the sector had generated value for Lebanese recruitment agencies, their shady foreign associates and — of course — the employers of kafala workers. All that began to change last October, as Lebanon’s economy entered an unprecedented free fall.
December 4, 2020 | English
BEIRUT, Dec 4 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Exhausted by economic collapse, COVID-19 and an explosion that devastated parts of the capital, Lebanon’s woes are taking a heavy toll on the nation’s mental health – especially among its most vulnerable people.
December 3, 2020 | English
Lebanese singer and songwriter, Tania Saleh posted a photo of herself with her face edited onto a black woman with an afro hairstyle to Twitter over the summer. Saleh thought by posting the photo she was showing solidarity for the Black Lives Matter movement. However, the message behind the image was deemed tone-deaf, racist and received backlash.
November 30, 2020 | English
This special report investigates the economic interests served by Lebanese recruitment of foreign domestic workers, thousands of whom are hired every year from countries like Ethiopia, Sri Lanka, Kenya, and the Philippines. Armed with information about the financial stakes in kafala, activists, journalists and others will be better equipped to campaign for an end to this retrograde, immoral, and fundamentally embarrassing system.
November 27, 2020 | English
November 27, 2020 | English
SEATTLE, Washington — Days after the Beirut explosion, protests began outside the city’s Kenyan consulate. Many of the protesters were Kenyan women migrant domestic workers stranded in Lebanon. In the past year, Lebanon’s economic crisis has intensified. COVID-19 and the massive explosion in Beirut further exacerbated the poor economic conditions. The rate of inflation has accelerated with the Lebanese pound losing 80% of its value since October. Prices of goods have skyrocketed. There have been electricity, food and medicine shortages. The kafala system, Lebanon’s system for migrant laborers, leaves migrant workers one of the more vulnerable groups in the country, without minimal legal protections.
November 26, 2020 | English
November 25, 2020 | English
Doha has announced a number of reforms in recent years, including a fund to support the payment of unpaid wages and the abolition of the kafala system, which ties workers' visas to their employers.