Doha, more rights to migrant domestic workers

Aug 31, 2017

DOHA: Domestic workers should work for a maximum of up to 10 hours, receive monthly payments and one holiday per week, as well as a three-week vacation during the year. This is the content of the new Qatar-approved law on the rights of domestic workers. The norm will protect thousands of home cooks and cleaners in the Gulf Country, almost all foreigners.

At the end of the contract, workers will also receive a three-week payment for each year of service. The law also prohibits the recruitment of people older than 60 and younger than 18. Emamin Tamin bin Hamad al-Thani issued the legislation last August 22, as reported by the Qatar news agency.

Hundreds of thousands of foreign workers have moved in recent years to the emirate, including 100,000 women employed as domestic workers.

This is the first time that regulations have been adopted. Domestic staff in the country had complained of slave-like conditions.

According to Guardian, in 2014, many foreign women employed in the country were forced to work for 100 hours a week. In addition, their passports were confiscated, their salary was withheld and many were victims of physical and sexual violence.

Recently, Qatar has also come under the pressure of the international community to improve the conditions of construction workers employed in the 2022 World Cup construction. At the moment, Qatar is under the scrutiny of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) which gave the country time until November to improve its human rights standards and not incur sanctions.

Qatar is not the only country in the area to be accused of abusing foreign workers. In 2015, Indonesia announced that it would stop sending domestic workers to 21 countries in the Middle East due to the ill-treatment that they suffered. -- AsiaNews