Domestic workers in Lebanon fight for right to join union

[Omaha Steve]

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/1/2/lebanese-domesticworkersorganizetoreformlaborcode.html

January 2, 2015 1:58PM ET by Ned Resnikoff @resnikoff

Lebanon could become the first Arab state to allow migrant domestic workers into a labor union if the country’s labor ministry approves a proposal submitted by the National Federation of Labor Unions.

The ministry announced on Monday that it had received the proposal, and that it was studying whether Lebanese labor law protects the right of migrant domestic workers to be in a union.

An estimated 200,000 migrant laborers are employed as domestic workers in Lebanon, according to a May 2014 report by the human rights group Anti-Slavery. Those workers, many of whom are Nepalese, are routinely subject to abusive practices that range from “non-payment of wages and no time off to forced and bonded labor and servitude,” according to the report. Of the employers surveyed by Anti-Slavery, fewer than 20 percent allowed their domestic workers to take a day off and leave the house.

The domestic workers seeking union recognition want to force a change to the kafala system, a labor law regime employed throughout much of the Arab world.

FULL story at link.