Domestic Workers

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her, scream at her face and also states in front of her racist statements : “My employer made me clean houses for her other family members without pay. She lent me out like I was her property.” - Ethiopian worker, 12 December 2010. (Hamill; KAFA), (Jureidini, Ray; ILO 2002).

An unequal relation starts to exist between the madam and the maid. The employer is the leader and the maid should obey her orders (Jureidini, Moukarbel; 30.4). The female employer prohibits her from going out and if she wants to go out she should take the permission from the madam. In addition, the maid is not allowed to have a day off to relax. However, she is always locked in the apartment. She does not have a leisure time, she should always be ready in case any member of the family needs her. The employer does not give the maid the right to have a phone, she lets her talk to her family once for week for example. The maid does not have the right to have friends the employer does not let her stand in the balcony to talk to her neighbor or visit any of her friends. Also, some workers do not have a private room they sleep in the kitchen, in the living room and sometimes in the balcony, they do not have a proper place to relax or sleep.

The freedom of maid’s movement is not controlled by the employer, it is controlled also by the agency. Every maid is not allowed to go back to her country without the agency permission. Besides that, some employer does not give enough food to her maid, she lets her eat after everyone eats. The worker does not have the freedom to choose her meal or to cook a meal that she likes. However, she is obliged to eat any meal even if she does not like it.

Foreign workers are physically abused by some employer and agencies as well. Fist, the employer may beat her maid for many purposes instead of talking to her and explaining her the mistake she made. The foreign workers do not understand Arabic so sometimes they may not understand what the employer is telling her. In this case the employer may beat her too. On the other hand, the employer may take her to the agency and tell the boss to beat her. To illustrate: “Madame slapped me. She pulled my hair. I run away. Police catch me on the Corniche [seafront walkway of Ras Beirut] and take me back to house. Madame take me back to agency. Agency man say I will die if I do not go back to madame and do what she say (interview with 22-year-old Sri Lankan).” ( Jureidini, Mukarbel; Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 30:4, July 2004,581–607)

Some agencies beat her and obliged her to go back to the employer apartment and do whatever she wants her to do without any objection.

The maid may be also abused by the male employer. Some of them try to be nice with the maid in order to exploit her sexually and take advantage of her vulnerability. The male employer gives her money to have a relationship with her, so he buys and sells her like commodities. And in case the maid refuses he may beat her or treat her in a very bad way. Workers are not only abused in the apartment where they work, they are also exploited sexually by men in the streets. Men usually insulted them and exploit them because they are very vulnerable. Moreover in many cases the worker gets pregnant her boss, and that what makes her lose her job.

Even though the workers should have their rights however, no one can deny the fact that there are workers who are not respectful, loyal, good at their jobs and sincere. Many cases were reported about a housemaid who stole money along with some goods from the house and escaped. Other cases went to a more extreme event where the worker in the house actually killed a child to prevent him from telling his parents about the things she stole.

In 2008, the Human Right Watch reported that every week one worker commits suicide in our country. After being abused and after facing all the struggles, these workers have no choice either suicide. In addition, these workers suffers from health condition, they are not well feed: they do not receive a healthy nutrition. Besides that, these workers are violated, beaten and abused. Because all of that, these workers suffer from physical and health problem which causes their