The Arab world needs to admit: It's racist

Mat Nashed is a journalist covering Middle East-related news. Focusing on black markets and migration, he has reported from Turkey, Lebanon and Tunisia, with his work appearing on VICE, Al-Monitor and Al-Jazeera.


Racism is a problem in the Arab world, yet too many people in the region deny it. Last week, an Ethiopian domestic worker fell from the balcony of her employer’s home in Kuwait. It was caught on camera, and though the woman survived, she later revealed that her employer was trying to kill her.

"The lady put me in the bathroom and was about to kill me in the bathroom without anybody finding out," the worker said.

"She would have thrown my body out like rubbish, so instead of staying there I went to save myself and then I fell."

This isn’t an isolated incident. Many Arab countries have maintained the kafala – or sponsorship system – which ties the legal status of low-wage migrant workers directly to their employer, giving the latter power to take away workers’ passports, withhold their salaries, and subject them to harrowing abuse.

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In places, such as Qatar and Kuwait, more than 90 percent of the labour force is imported from South and Southeast Asia and Africa. Most workers elect to migrate to these countries since it remains one of few viable options to support their families back home.

Recruiters do their part to lure workers by propagating false promises of a fair wage and a day off each week. It’s not until many workers arrive that they realise they’ve been trafficked into performing slave-like labour which they would have never consented to.

The International Trade Union Confederation estimates that more than 4,000 low wage workers will die while building infrastructure for Qatar’s 2022 FIFA World Cup.

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Domestic migrant workers – generally women – are even more vulnerable. In Lebanon, they are excluded from basic protections under the labour law. And like elsewhere in the region, many are locked indoors and routinely subjected to starvation, rape and death. The female head of the household is sometimes the perpetrator, or in the very least, complicit in the abuse.

In 2008, Human Rights Watch found that at least one domestic migrant worker in Lebanon was dying each week as a result of "unnatural causes" such as alleged suicide or after suspiciously falling from tall buildings. Activists suspect that the rate of deaths remains just as high today.

Politicians never seem to take the mistreatment of migrant workers seriously enough. Former Lebanese labour minister Sejaan Azzi went so far as to say that abuse against domestic workers was "‘exaggerated" despite mounting evidence to the contrary.

Local rights groups have nonetheless lobbied tirelessly in support of migrant workers, yet large segments of Lebanese society continue to normalise racism.

It’s no secret, for instance, that domestic workers from Africa and South Asia are typically the cheapest to recruit. Filipino workers are at the top of the racial hierarchy because of their lighter skin. While their wages are also abysmal, they generally receive more money.

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http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/arab-world-needs-admit-its-racist-1311740542