Trần, Angie Ngọc

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California State University, Monterey Bay Digital Commons @ CSUMB SBGS Faculty Publications and Presentations Social Behavioral and Global Studies 11-29-2021 Modern-day slavery: Vietnamese women domestic workers in Saudi Arabia Angie Ngọc Trần Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.csumb.edu/sbgs_fac This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Social Behavioral and Global Studies at Digital Commons @ CSUMB. It has been accepted for inclusion in SBGS Faculty Publications and Presentations by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ CSUMB. For more information, please contact digitalcommons@csumb.edu. Modern-day slavery: Vietnamese womendomestic workers in Saudi ArabiaANGIE NGOC TRAN - 29 NOV, 2021The recent death of an underage woman, H Xuân Siu, an ethnic minority Jarai fromDakLak, Vietnam, who was recruited to work as a domestic worker in Saudi Arabia,shocked the world. More details, exposed on Facebook by her sister-in-law andother news outlets reveal an exploitative transnational labour export system thatsends young and old women from poor areas in Vietnam to work as domesticworkers in the private homes of their visa sponsors in the Gulf states. As of 2020,nearly 7,000 women are employed as domestic workers for Saudi families. WhileCOVID-19 exacerbates the vulnerability of all overseas migrant workers, it is worsefor domestic workers because they are invisible and isolated in their sponsors’houses, and are completely at the mercy of their sponsors. The Kafala (visasponsorship) system dictates the employment conditions for foreign guest-workers in the Gulf states. In domestic work, the sponsor is the head of householdand also the employer, whose authority goes unquestioned and unsupervised.Domestic workers are tied to the original sponsors who can deport them if theyare not pleased with the workers’ service, or transfer them from one household toanother without any consent from the workers (a rampant practice during COVID-19). Workers cannot venture outside because their passports are con scated bytheir employers as soon as they set foot in the destination countries. From thenon, many are treated as slaves, not knowing whether they will be paid or not,going hungry, and enduring physical and sexual abuses until they manage toreturn to Vietnam.H Xuân Siu was only 16 when recruited by VINACO, a recruitment company inVietnam which is a member of VAMAS, a Vietnamese Association of ManpowerSupply sanctioned by the Ministry of the Interior since 2003. VINACO is alleged tohave increased her age in order for her to work in Saudi Arabia. After two years ofworking there, she pleaded to return home but died of heart failure at 18. But shedied having made allegations of physical abuse perpetrated by her sponsor, whichwere recorded in phone conversations with her friends. The family pleaded tobring her body home but VINACO refused unless the family accepted the incorrectage they put on her passport (which listed her birth year as 1996, rather than thecorrect year of 2003). This delay caused her  nal burial to take place in SaudiArabia on November 4, 2021, devastating her family in Vietnam.However, there are other tragic cases that have not been brought to the attentionof the global community. A young woman (of Kinh descent) died abruptly and wasburied in Saudi Arabia from COVID-19 while employed as a domestic worker for afamily in Riyadh City. She left behind two young children and a frail father. Shepromised to return to her family for good in October 2020, and the family waitedand waited until the bad news came in December. In conversation with thejournalist who wrote this article, I found out that the sponsor had owed her backwages and only paid them to the family when the violation was exposed inVietnamese article, which pressured the local government to intervene on behalfof this poor family.Social media and independent news outlets have exposed these abuses and howthese domestic workers were abandoned not only by the recruitment companies,but also by the Vietnamese embassy there. They found rampant physical abuses ofVietnamese domestic workers in Saudi Arabia. Speaking on behalf of a group ofdomestic workers in a deportation camp in Riyadh, a female domestic workerrecorded a poignant SOS message addressed directly to the Vietnamese PrimeMinister, the Vietnamese Embassy there and the internet community to bring themhome because they have been stuck there (some for over a year) due to manyabuses not of their own making. Other sources show photos of physically andsexually abused workers who took refuge in a Riyadh shelter after running awayfrom their Saudi sponsors.Why are these abuses hidden until it is too late for some women? We need tounderstand the self-sustaining and coherent transnational labour brokeragesystem that exploits and abuses domestic workers, in order to demand reformsand justice for these domestic workers.In 2014, the Vietnamese and Saudi Arabian governments signed a  ve-year labouragreement to send women from Vietnam to work as domestic workers in SaudiArabia. It included an automatic renewal clause, supposed to be activated in 2019.This agreement bene ts ministries of both governments, the recruitmentcompanies from both sides, and the sponsors’ households in the host country; theprogram rests on the backs of migrant workers, 100% are women of differentethnic groups from Vietnam who earn US$400 per month, working 7 days a weekand over 12 hours per day. After a lot of searching, I could not  nd anyannouncement about the renewal or any update of the terms. But I found reportsof the VAMAS decision on December 17, 2020, to form and appoint the leaders forthe Department on the Middle East Domestic Help Market, with the generalpresident of VINACO joint stock company as one of the leaders serving on thisboard. This suggests that this bilateral labour agreement has been renewed withall of the existing stipulations that imperil potential domestic workers.Even under increasing global pressure, Saudi Arabia excluded domestic migrantworkers from the so-called reform of the Kafala system which went into effect onMarch 14, 2021. Domestic workers and farmers continue to be the least protected,most vulnerable to abuse, and not covered by the labour law. Under this half-hearted Kafala system, domestic workers are still denied all protections, includingthe right to join trade unions or strike.Reading exchanges on the public Facebook page on Saudi Arabia reveal all typesof contract violations endured by domestic workers: not having enough food toeat, no break times in a 12-hour plus workday, not receiving personal hygieneitems and medical supplies as contractually agreed, and not receiving wages in full.Their passports are con scated, so they cannot even leave the house or use theirpassports to buy a commercial plane ticket home using their own savings. Manydomestic workers have  nished their 2-year contracts but are stranded in SaudiArabia due to COVID-19 and want to go home to reunite with their families. Mostcannot afford exorbitantly expensive chartered airfares (upwards of US$3000) toreturn to Vietnam. Most are completely at the mercy of the sponsors who makefalse promises to buy plane tickets for them. VINACO has representatives in Riyadhbut they have turned a blind eye to workers’ pleas, as aptly described by acommon Vietnamese saying: “Leaving babies stranded in the market-place.”International labour and migration organizations, including the InternationalLabour Organization (ILO), International Organisation for Migration (IOM), andGlobal Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD) need to pay attention toabuses suffered by domestic workers who are still stuck in Saudi Arabia. Theyneed to scrutinise the genuine implementation of the VAMAS code of conduct andhold its recruitment company members, including VINACO, accountable to andcompliant with their code of conduct. Evidence shows that VINACO has beendoing exactly the opposite of the code of conduct to which they subscribe andthey continue to lead the Department on the Middle East Domestic Help Market toensure that this system functions for their bene t. Moreover, the promise made bythe Deputy Minister for  International Labor Affairs of Saudi Arabia  as signatory ofthe 2014 labour agreement on fair and humane treatment of domestic workersneeds to be ful lled by the Saudi Ministry of Labor, especially when this agreementappears to have been renewed for  ve more years.Worse yet, there is no monitoring of the proper implementation of the terms of the contracts. While the revision of the Vietnamese Law 72 (2006), Law69/2020/QH14 (starting January 1, 2022) forbids brokerage fees, this stipulation does not help Vietnamese domestic workers when the Kafala system is still in place: “migrant worker can end a contract with a recruitment company if it is not implemented correctly.” The contract is signed between the sponsor and the Vietnamese domestic workers (many do not have a high school degree, only speak Vietnamese and cannot even keep their passports) and witnessed by a Saudi recruitment company sanctioned by the Saudi government. According to this common contract, the Vietnamese recruitment company and the Vietnamese Embassy play no role in Saudi Arabia to protect their citizens when their rights are violated and they want to end the contract. The embassy only makes announcements when a tragic event happens or when claiming that they “do not leave anyone behind”. Meanwhile some Vietnamese newspapers called out the need to protect Vietnamese citizens’ legal rights and interests while working overseas and reported cases of recruitment companies’ leaving workers stranded in Saudi Arabia.At the time of writing, it is uncertain whether the Saudi sponsors will ful ll their side of the contract: buying plane tickets home for the workers who have served them past the end of the 2-year contracts. What is clear is that hundreds, if not thousands, of Vietnamese workers desperately want to  y home to their families, but the sponsors have been dragging their feet to buy the plane tickets for them. COVID-19 has given them an excuse to continue exploiting these workers who work tirelessly to care for sponsors’ children and families, while their own families await their return and while most workers are unable to afford commercial or chartered plane tickets.If this is not modern-day forced labour and slavery, then what is? It would be a mockery to the vision of international labour standards, human decency and compassion enshrined by the ILO, IOM and other UN organizations not to intervene to rescue these stranded domestic workers. Both the Vietnamese and Saudi Arabian governments should pay for humanitarian  ights to bring those domestic workers who wish to return home, so they can reunite with their families. It is long overdue for the global community to put pressure on the transnational labour brokerage system to prevent these modern-day slavery practices.

Modern-day slavery: Vietnamese women domestic workers in Saudi Arabia

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Modern-day slavery: Vietnamese women domestic workers in Saudi Arabia

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