Who Will Protect the Maids?

I was shocked to read of 16,000 foreign maids fleeing the homes of their Saudi employers in just one year. A figure like this should make readers wonder about the reasons that drive so many maids to run away from their employers. Being the weaker half of the partnership, maids are always held responsible and blamed for everything that happens to them. Newspapers and magazines devote full pages to “crimes committed by maids” against what is always portrayed as an ideal family employing them. The papers keep telling us about the humane and compassionate treatment maids receive at the hands of employers who are keen to protect their rights.

What is being published will continue to represent half the truth as long as we continue to criticize others openly while failing to judge ourselves using the same standards. Not all of us are as perfect, ideal and good-hearted as the media tries to portray. There are families who treat maids like machines which are void of any human feelings. Those families ignore cultural differences and the suffering endured by foreigners who are living and working far away from their homes. Others think they are still living in the era of slave girls, overlooking that the women they employ have left behind children, husbands and parents and have come here in search of a decent wage to support their families.

We must begin asking serious questions about the reasons maids run away from their employers. We must admit that to a large extent we ourselves are at fault. What about the illegal networks active in smuggling and finding jobs for maids: Would this go on if we stopped dealing with the networks and supporting them? Would a maid run away if her employers treated her well and were considerate of her rights and feelings?

Instead of allowing individuals to bring in maids under their sponsorship, we should only let recruitment offices do so. That way, anyone wanting to hire a maid would have to deal directly with the offices, and they should work to organize the relation between the employer and employee in a way that guarantees the rights of both parties. If nothing is done, maids will continue to run away and the problem will persist.