Adila from Tanzania who was overworked and underpaid in Oman ©2017 Rothna Begum/Human Rights Watch
Overworked and underpaid
In 2017, Human Rights Watch documented cases of Tanzanian women who had worked in the Middle East and one of the most common complaints was overworking.
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According to one of the interviewees, her employer confiscated her documents and forced her to work 21 hours a day without rest or an off-day.
Sometimes they would not be paid for all the work they have done and would be asked to pay back the recruitment fee that brought them to the country in the first place. According to HRW:
“Hidaya Z.,” 30, said for almost two years, her employers had forced her to work 17 hours a day with no rest, and no day off, confined her to the home when they left the house, insulted her, paid her 50 OMR ($130) instead of the 80 OMR ($208) her contract required, and failed to pay her six months’ salary.
These women and many others usually find themselves back in Africa without anything to show for their hard work in these Arab countries except physical and emotional pain.
