By Andrew Irumba
Kampala: The latest reaching our desk from labour exportation, or call it ‘polished slavery’ or ‘modern day slavery’, according to some historians, is that a couple of innocent ‘bright future seeking’ Ugandans, including girls and boys are not only running nuts but rotting away helplessly in Arab countries due to pathetic living conditions they’re being subjected to by their bosses in UAE.
To make matters worse, Ugandan diplomats attached to Uganda’s embassy in Saudi, whom you think these poor Ugandans would get assistance from, are actually also literally grassing there, surviving each day like a drunkard’s cock (….in our local dialect here in Uganda….). Our sources say there intimated to this reporter that actually the embassy offices alone are being thrown out of the house over accumulated rent arrears!
Further more, the ambassador with his entire staff survive on meagre hand-outs from friends, and the ‘deals’ they make using their office influence in order to survive, according to our inside sources.
READ ALSO: Gov’t Finally Clears Resumption Of Labor Export Business For All Licensed Companies
Baker Akantabira, the Chairman of the umbrella organization of Labour exporters in Uganda termed Uganda Association of External Recruitment Agencies (UAERA), who travelled to specifically Saudi Arabia on January 18, 2021, on fact finding mission on the actual life style of these innocent teenagers couldn’t believe what he found on ground.
READ ALSO: Minister Kamuntu Condemns Exportation Of Labour To UAE
According to him, the situation is soo alarming that require Ugandan Government top officials to intervene to save situation.
“When I arrived in Saudi, with my own eyes, I saw a number of workers who had been chased from houses by their Arab bosses due to various reasons, sleeping under the trees at Ugandan Embassy with nothing to eat, no medical assistance, no nothing! Others have even started becoming insane, conditions have deteriorated their mental faculties,” Baker was quoted saying by our sources in Saudi at the embassy.
Girls who are still sleeping under the embassy trees alleg that Embassy officials are not helpful at all, that many times they keep abusing them, chasing them away from the embassy premises citing lack of funds to assist them.
“When we request the officials here to assist us by taking us back to Uganda, they instead list for us their problems which they say Government is not working on. They show you that they even eat meals on credit, sleep on credit, now we’re stack,” one of the girls told our source.
“The situation here is disheartening whereby some girls have been sleeping under the tree outside the Embassy for over two weeks and their offices both in Saudi and in Uganda are not responsive,” said Mr Baker in a letter sent to his UAERA members asking each company to improvise $300 to save distressed workers since the Embassy is in a total mess to act.
READ ALSO: Uganda Bans Labour Export to Oman Over Human Trafficking
Below Is Baker’s Full Text He Sent To UAERE Members While In Saudi Which Our Spy Intercepted
“As you may already be aware. I have been in Saudi Arabia since 18th January looking into matters of our Migrant Workers.
The situation here is disheartening:
1. Rent for the shelter expired on 31st December and was not renewed now over 47 girls are at the mercy of God actually their stories can make you CRY!
2. Some girls have been sleeping under the tree outside the Embassy for over two weeks and their offices (here in Saudi and in Uganda are not responsive)
3. I have met two depressed girls our Embassy who have run mad due to sponsor abuses a d lack medical attention
4.The Ambassador’s rent expired and there is no money to renew this puts our own diplomat in total jeopardy
5. Medical bill’s accumulated and now the Embassy has no credit facility from the health facility….meaning????
6. The situation is so bad that our embassy staff have resorted to pulling their own personal resources to send critical cases to the hospital.
7. The job order processing system is down for lack of money to renew the licenses and servicing…NO JOB ORDER CAN BE PROCESSED. if we want job orders to be processed we must finance the Embassy because they used their money to look after our girls
We (together with Embassy staff) costed the immediate things to fix and we need at least US$50,000 as early as yesterday. Short of that, the Ambassador has already written to MGLSD to close this business until funds are availed to them.
READ ALSO: Ugandans Furious Over Middle East Consultants Illegal Operations
NOW
A.Following our resolution at the member’s GM that each company advances ar least US$300 for fixing a few things in Saudi. I took courage and travelled here expecting that you(members) would have paid by now!!
B. I have called the ED and the Treasurer to send me whatever is available but the response I am getting is that there is no reasonable money to send me yet the situation is that BAD
C.I am appealing to all of you to send in money to the secretariat ASAP so that it is wired to me and we help fix some of these critical issues!
D. I have committed myself to the Ambassador..and I was meant to return tomorrow BUT I’m not leaving Saudi until the money is availed.
D. I request all who CARE about this business to COME OUT and TAKE ACTION
Baker Akantabira: CHAIRMAN UAERA”
Torch In Baker’s Findings.
According to research from the Uganda Bureau of Statistics and International Labour Organization (ILO), young Ugandan women (aged between 15-29 years) face a number of hurdles in the labour market, from higher unemployment rates to lower wages.
READ ALSO: Oman President Dies After Years Of Enslaving Ugandans
As a result, many young women try to escape unemployment and poverty at home, often end up as domestic workers in the Middle East where over the years, there has been systematic documentation of cases of exploitation, physical and/or sexual abuse, and even fatalities.
In late 2015, Saudi Arabia and Uganda signed a deal which could have provided as many as two million jobs for Ugandans in the oil-rich Gulf nation. But the deal was terminated in January 2016 after the Ugandan parliament banned the transit of migrant workers to Saudi Arabia following shocking revelations of abuse and torture.
READ ALSO: AFLAAK Recruitment Agency Boss Connives With Arabian Slave Owners To Torture Ugandan Maid
An inter-ministerial task force was formed to tackle the abuse and exploitation of Ugandan migrant domestic workers immediately after the issuing of the ban and later, the ban was reversed following the signing of bilateral agreements with Saudi Arabia and Jordan hoping to curb these mistreatments something that has not worked out.
But activists say that economics may have played a role in the government’s decision to lift the ban. With over 59,000 Ugandans currently working in the Middle East, according to figures from the Ministry of Labour, the East African nation receives over US$1.4 billion annually.
