BY VICTOR AHIUMA-YOUNG

FEDERATION of Informal Workers’ Organizations of Nigeria, FIWON, has called on the Federal Government to immediately ratify and domesticate the Domestic Workers Convention adopted by International Labour Organisation, ILO member countries on June 16, 2011.

General Secretary of FIWON, Comrade Gbenga Komolafe, in a statement, pleaded with the government to join a growing number of governments that are taking measures to address the exploitation and abuse that domestic workers go through.

FIWON, an umbrella for informal, self employed Nigerians in the informal sectors of the Nigerian economy, has been organizing domestic workers into a union of their own in the past few months.

According to the statement, “The gruesome stories of gross abuse and inhumanity suffered by domestic workers we have been working with in Nigeria, demonstrates the pivotal importance of the adoption of this new convention. Isolated in private homes, domestic workers suffer psychological, physical, and sexual abuse. Women and girls have told us that their employers beat them with belts, sticks, and electrical cords, knocked their heads against walls, and burned their skin with irons, chemicals, and boiling water.

They described being propositioned, groped, and raped by men in the household. Many were afraid of reporting sexual violence because of the risk of being fired from their jobs and turned out onto the street. Domestic workers often are regarded as mere ‘house helps’ without any rights either as a worker or as a human being.

A domestic worker may be asked to leave work at any time without any prior notice on flimsy excuse or because she fell ill, she is paid a very low wage, her wages may be cut for no just cause, she may not even get paid at all, the hours of work may be 12 hours or even 24 hours a day, she may be beaten, verbally abused, falsely accused of theft, raped or even killed, the workload can be too heavy because it is not regulated, she may not go on leave or holidays, she may suffer diseases as a result of her back breaking work, she may not get sickness benefit or retirement benefit, she does not enjoy most of the benefit a worker should enjoy.

In gross violations of the Child Rights Act and the Universal Basic Education Act, many children, mostly young women and girls as young as eight years old are forced to work as domestic workers under gruesome conditions without access to any form of education or schooling all for very little or no pay whatsoever.”

“We are dealing with a complete range from exploitation, physical, psychological, sexual in some areas to carrying very heavy loads, to being exposed to chemicals, to working long hours, to working in repetitive tasks, to working in isolation all conditions that stunts normal physical and mental growth and development of children.

The Convention establishes the right of domestic workers to be informed, in a manner they could understand, of what the terms and conditions of their employment are: what is the work they need to carry out, how long they are expected to work, and how much, when and in what manner will they be paid. It also establishes limits to the proportion of remuneration that can be paid in kind, and provides for a weekly rest of at least 24 consecutive hours.

The Convention also provides for special measures to address the vulnerability of particular groups of domestic workers: young domestic workers – those above the minimum age of employment and below 18 years of age – live-in domestic workers, as well as migrant domestic workers. For live-in workers, it sets minimum requirements in terms of accommodation and privacy.”

“It requires member States to set a minimum age of employment for admission to domestic work, and to adopt measures so that child domestic workers can finish compulsory schooling, if they have not been able to do so because they engaged in domestic work at a very young age, and to facilitate their further education and vocational training. We urge that Nigeria should join a growing number of governments that are taking measures to address the shameful exploitation and abuse that domestic workers endure.”

Jordan amended its labour law to guarantee domestic workers a weekly day of rest, paid annual and sick leave, and a 10-hour work day. Zambia and South Africa are countries that have taken similar measures.”