UPDATES TO KAFALA
The definitive place to get the latest updates on Kafala.
September 16, 2020 | English
The group of 18 left Beirut on Sunday and Monday in batches of nine and were expected in Nairobi by Tuesday, closing a chapter that has dented Kenya's image abroad after reports emerged that officials at the Lebanon consulate were mistreating needy women.
September 15, 2020 | English
Lebanon has approved a new work contract allowing foreign domestic workers to resign and keep hold of their own passport, but activists say the exploitative ‘kafala’ system remains in place. The economic crisis-hit Mediterranean country is home to around 250,000 migrants, mostly women from Africa and Asia, who toil away in people's homes as housekeepers, carers or nannies. They are not protected by the country's labour law, but instead work under a set of laws, policies and customs called kafala, repeatedly slammed by rights groups as allowing a wide range of abuse.
September 15, 2020 | English
Ms Wambui has experienced sexual harassment, insults and slavery.
She ended up at the Kenyan consulate in Beirut, where she sought help to travel back home. Her boss was forced to pass on her passport.
September 14, 2020 | English
The young Nigerian woman had been injured in the Aug. 4 Beirut blast, which ripped through the Lebanese capital, killing 190 people injuring a further 6,500 and damaging 40 percent of the city. However, it’s not her injuries keeping her in Lebanon but a restrictive and abusive system of migrants laws.
September 14, 2020 | English
This year, Qatar announced new laws to abolish the #Kafala system. In this article, Marya Al-Hindi discusses the Kafala system in Lebanon and Bahrain & explains how abuses under the system continue to persist despite reforms in Bahrain.
September 14, 2020 | English
While South African diplomats and officials are busying siphoning funds kept aside for Covid-19 recovery, migrant workers are tolling it out in Lebanon. The low skilled workers are having a harrowing time in Lebanon where the political and economical conditions have hit rock bottom.
September 14, 2020 | English
Outside Ethiopia’s consulate in Lebanon’s capital Beirut, about 60 young women brace themselves for another night of sleeping on the street. They used to be employed as housekeepers, but the combination of a crippling economic crisis and the Covid-19 pandemic meant that they were laid off and kicked out of their employers’ homes.
September 14, 2020 | English
Government approves new work contract for foreign workers to give them more rights. Many families paying workers in the devaluated local currency as Lebanon is mired in crisis
September 13, 2020 | English
Lebanon has approved a new work contract allowing foreign domestic workers to resign and keep hold of their own passport, but activists say the exploitative "kafala" system remains in place.
September 13, 2020 | English
Lebanon’s economic and coronavirus crises have increased the urgency for reform over the past year, with many families now paying their workers in the devaluated local currency, and some not at all.