Modern-day Slavery
A few weeks ago I got an email from Freedom United about the re-arrest of an anti-slavery activist Biram Dah Abeid in Mauritania. I was a little puzzled because I began wondering how old he was and how Mauritania could have arrested a person who was likely close to a hundred years old — I assumed this was a person who had fought against slavery during Mauritania’s colonial period before it became an independent country in 1960. I immediately went to look him up to find out his history and it turns out that he has been fighting against the enslavement of the Haratin people otherwise known as the black moors (descendants of black Africans captured during historical slave raids) by the lighter skinned population who are of Arab descents. He is only 53 years old!
Mauritania was the last country in the world to abolish slavery in 1981 and as recently as 2015, an independent organization estimated that about 600,000 people are currently enslaved in Mauritania making it the country with the highest proportion of people in slavery in any country in the world.
The report further went on to explain that slaves can be bought and sold or given away as gifts, that slavery exists in bigger cities and small towns and that women were highly “disproportionately affected” in that they worked as domestic staff, cared for their owners children and were often subject to sexual/physical assault by their masters.
When I was discovering all these things about slavery in Mauritania, I felt anger, disappointment and sadness and wondered how modern day slavery still continued despite “open condemnation” across the world.
While I was on my soapbox, still venting to the people around me about the state of things in Mauritania, I started scrolling through my daily feed of Nigerian news and came across a story of a woman in Lagos who had burned her househelp with an iron because she had burned the meal she was preparing. In that moment, it clicked — this girl is this woman’s maid and she was brought to Lagos to serve this woman with the promise of sending her “salary” to her folks who live in another town — she is given the title househelp — expected to cook, clean and run errands, expected to care for the woman’s children, she is often mistreated and beaten mercilessly in the event that she makes a mistake. Is this not a form of modern day slavery? — When your “employer” can mistreat you as they see fit, has the audacity to punish you for your mistakes by beating you, starving you for days or inflicting injuries on you and you have no choice but to accept it as “the way things are”.
Unfortunately it can be stated as fact that most Nigerians have either witnessed the mistreatment of a domestic staff or perpetrated the mistreatment themselves. In Lagos for example, it is not uncommon to see children, teenagers or young adults from poor homes in smaller towns that moved to Lagos to serve as domestic staff in order to earn a living for their families. It is also not uncommon to see relatives (children, teenagers or young adults) who were forcibly turned into domestic staff after they moved to Lagos to live with their aunt or uncle’s family. In both cases, there are uncountable stories of maltreatment, abuse, assault which are now exposed online almost every day- it is in short modern day slavery.
Growing up, my neighbor — a couple with two kids aged 5 and 2, had the wives’ little cousin move in with them, she had moved from their state of origin to live with them in Lagos. Perhaps, she was sent to live with her aunt in Lagos to get better education, more exposure, better food, better living condition etc. However, this was not the case. Her maltreatment ranged from having to eat only after everyone else had eaten to going so late to a poorly ran government grammar school. Every day, she had to make breakfast, sweep the flat, shower and dress her cousins for school and then walk them to school. She also had to come back from school early so she could go get her cousins from school — walk them home, cook lunch, plan for dinner, clean up after everyone, wash her one school uniform before going to bed. This was her routine and any day she deviated from this plan, made a slight mistake or forgot to do something (burn rice, forget to sweep, forget to wash clothes, break a dish), she was beaten mercilessly with the nearest object her aunt could find at the time. She couldn’t have been older than 10 or 11 years old.
Over the years, I wondered if she had siblings, when last she saw her parents and what her loved ones would think if they saw how she was living — for all they knew, she was in Lagos, learning and enjoying life. I am not aware of the state of things in her parent’s household but I doubt they would have been happy with how she was being treated in her aunt’s house.
Back then, everyone around could identify the situation as very wrong but no one ever said anything, we all used to give her food, money and tried to be nicer to her than her aunts family — one could easily see the unhappiness in her face, it lingered even when she laughed. I couldn’t label it then but now with an understanding of what modern day slavery is, it is clear to me that she was enslaved. This story is not unique, because I am certain that many Nigerians can give similar accounts of stories like this.
What upsets me is that there are still some Nigerians that see nothing wrong with the mistreatment of domestic staff. We shouldn’t witness neighbors mistreating their maids/domestic staff and look the other way. We are so immersed in this culture of having maids/domestic staff by all means, even the people who have no use for maids, hire them to affirm their societal stand as Nigeria’s so-called upper middle class. I am all for any form of legal employment and see nothing wrong with being a maid/domestic staff. What I have an issue with is an abusive employer. Whatever the case may be, if you can afford to pay the hired help and you understand that they are employees and not slaves, then do go ahead and hire the help you want/need but please treat them the way you would want your loved ones to be treated if they one day took on a job as a domestic staff. How would my neighbor have liked it if her child was a maid to someone who then burned her with a boiling ring because she burned a pot of beans?
Then the situation where a family member moves to stay with their relative and forcibly gets turned into a house help is so disgusting and disappointing. If you want the person to contribute to the house hold chores, simply assign (age appropriate) tasks to them that they can handle but don’t take away the persons dignity as a human being or expose them to a very difficult life filled with all forms of maltreatment.
Thankfully, the news of this woman that inflicted wounds on her house maid made it to social media and the police was alerted and it was reported that she would face criminal charges. Also, it is worth noting that over the years some Nigerians have come to publicly show outrage for mistreatment of domestic staff in Nigeria however the issue still persists. We need to get rid of the notion that mistreatment of domestic staff is at all an option. We need laws to protect domestic staff in Nigeria, a way to ensure that they are rightfully paid for their services and lastly a fair medium to report any case of abuse.
Back to Mauritania, Please consider signing the petition to help free Biram Dah Abeid — Mauritania’s anti-slavery activist through this link.
