Ethiopian servants in Sudan at the mercy of middle men
Fatima Ahmed was fifteen years old when she walked thousands of miles from her village in Southern Ethiopia to Sudan. Ahmed, who was motherless from an early age, emigrated in the hope of earning enough to support her blind father and large family.
When I reached the Sudanese border and entered eastern Sudan, I couldn’t walk for two weeks. My feet were so swollen and I was so exhausted,” says Ahmed who does not want to use her real name for fear of reprisals.
Like thousands of her compatriots, Ahmed, who left school years ago, saw Sudan as an escape route from poverty.
A returnee shelter in Juba, May 17.
Until recently, Sudanese households in Khartoum, Sudan’s capital, employed domestic servants from South Sudan and the Nuba Mountains. But the potential workforce has shrunk as South Sudanese returned home, first following the peace deal between the North and the South in 2005, then South Sudan’s independence.
Gradually South Sudanese domestic workers were replaced with Ethiopians and, sometimes, Eritreans.
Mohammed A., who does not want to be identified, acts as a middle-man for Ethiopian servants in a neighbourhood in Khartoum North, insists that they do not traffic girls by force.
We help relatives or acquaintances come to Sudan and help them find jobs,” says Mohammed.
In an old house in Khartoum North, known locally as the Ethiopians House”, a few girls were in a room making coffee and chatting. Some stayed there while attempting to find work while others were on a rare day off from their duties.
Asked if he profits from getting the girls a job, Mohammed A. says: I don’t take their salaries, I charge 50 Sudanese Pounds (US$11) from the employer when I bring the girl to them.”
It does not always work this way. Many young girls find themselves working hard and giving almost all of their salary to a middle-man.
I brought her to Sudan, I helped her find work and I housed her and fed her before she found work.”
Ahmed was among the girls who was ripped off in Sudan. She found work through a young Ethiopian, who identified himself as M.G. He has lived in Sudan for years but has never worked, instead using his connections to find employment for the girls. He takes a 50 Sudanese Pounds commission from the employer and comes back on a monthly basis to pick up the worker’s entire salary.
I will take the girl’s salary for the first four months,” said M.G. over the phone when asked anonymously how to get a domestic-worker.
And life did not get easier for Ahmed when she found work. Four months into her new job, the middle-man took her by force from her employer’s house -- a trick to enable him to earn another commission and take another four months of the girl’s earnings.
He asked me to turn off my phone and locked me in the house, I couldn’t contact the woman I worked for,” says Ahmed. She was only returned to her employer after her captor was threatened by the police.
I brought her to Sudan, I helped her find work and I housed her and fed her before she found work,” explained M.G. in a phone interview.
M.G. argued that Ahmed owes him 1,500 SDG ($300) while Ahmed said she did not cost him any money.
For more background information download the 2011 study by the International Labour Organisation (ILO): "Trafficking in Persons Overseas for Labour Purposes: The Case of Ethiopian Domestic Workers"
The overwhelming majority of domestic workers do not have official documentation, making them vulnerable to exploitation. They are stuck in Sudan unless they sneak back into Ethiopia through the border in Blue Nile State.
Without a passport, it is hard for the young women to seek help at the embassy if they face abuse or harassment from their employers or the police.
There has long been a sizeable Ethiopian presence in Sudan. Poverty and a brutal military dictatorship forced over 1,000 Eritreans and Ethiopians across the porous border into Sudan each month, according to estimates from the UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR.
The police cracked down on Ethiopians in Khartoum recently,” says a police officer, adding that people without documentation will be deported to ed- Damazin in Blue Nile State and taken to the Ethiopian border.
The threat of arrest and deportation makes it almost impossible for the girls to move freely in an unfamiliar country where they barely speak the language. Instead, they are left at the mercy of the middle men.
