Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed speaks at the Stanley
Hotel in Nairobi on August 31, 2015, during a World Trade Organization
conference. Ms Mohammed told the Nation that some recruitment agents had
violated a government ban on labour migration announced last year.
PHOTO | SALATON NJAU | NATION MEDIA GROUP
Kenya has been listed by a United States government report among
countries that serve as transit points and destinations for human
trafficking.
This came even as Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed told the Nation that some recruitment agents had violated a government ban on labour migration announced last year.
Hundreds
of Kenyans are still exported for domestic jobs in Oman, Qatar,
Lebanon, Serbia and Saudi Arabia, among other countries.
It
has also emerged that Kenyans retiring from the Kenya Defence Forces,
the Kenya Forestry Service, the Kenya Police Service, the Kenya Wildlife
Service and other armed forces are being recruited to serve in various
security agencies in war-torn Iraq and Afghanistan.
ACTIONABLE ACTS
Ms
Mohamed warned that the State was keenly monitoring the actors and that
much more punitive measures would be taken against them.
“Last
year in October we banned the export of domestic labour and informed
the recruiting agencies that they should desist from recruiting.
“But I have been informed they have violated the order. This cannot be accepted,” Ms Mohamed told the Nation in an interview.
Though
it was not in the interest of the government to permanently ban human
manpower exports, regulations must first be put in place to ensure
Kenyans are not exploited by their hosts and that the recruitment
agencies take responsibility when workers get into trouble with their
employers, the minister noted.
The report by the US
State Department says: “Kenyans voluntarily migrate to other East
African nations, South Sudan, Europe, the US and the Middle East — particularly Saudi Arabia and Oman —
in search of employment where at times they are exploited in domestic
servitude, massage parlours and brothels or forced manual labour.”
A DEATH TRAP
The report also reveals that hundreds of gay and bisexual Kenyans are lured from Kenyan universities with promises of overseas jobs but are forced into prostitution in Qatar and the United Arabs Emirates.
The report also reveals that hundreds of gay and bisexual Kenyans are lured from Kenyan universities with promises of overseas jobs but are forced into prostitution in Qatar and the United Arabs Emirates.
Recruitment networks operating in Kenya have their wings and bases spreading to Uganda and Rwanda.
“Nairobi-based
labour recruiters maintain networks in Uganda that recruit Rwandan and
Ugandan workers through fraudulent offers of employment in the Middle
East and Asia,” the report reveals.
It further discloses that Kenyan women are subjected to forced prostitution in Thailand by Ugandan and Nigerian traffickers.
The
report said that though Kenya had not complied with minimum standards
for eliminating trafficking, some positive efforts have been made.
AUSPICIOUS EFFORTS
Last year the government prosecuted 65 trafficking cases, while in 2013, some 33 traffickers were punished.
In 2014, some 658 child trafficking victims were reportedly identified in 18 out of the 47 counties in Kenya.
The government also identified 12 adult trafficking victims exploited overseas and assisted in their repatriation.
In
April this year, Kenyans in the diaspora, led by Kenya Diaspora
Alliance (KDA) convener Dr Shem Ochuodho and Mr Milla Menga, rescued a
Kenyan woman, Ms Sylvia Anyango, who was detained by her employer in
Lebanon.
Efforts by the KDA to have the government
support her repatriation fell flat, but Kenyans living abroad donated
money to buy the woman an air ticket back home.
“Sometimes (the) government is very slow in helping Kenyans who get into trouble while migrating for greener pastures.
“We had to step in to support Ms Anyang
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