The United Arab Emirates is known to be flocked by people from around the world, looking for job opportunities, a better lifestyle and yet most of them ending up abused and cheated. As much as the Gulf nation is a hub of fortune for many, it is also known for abusing foreigners and expatriates as compared to the Emirati citizens. In a recent report by the Democracy Centre for Transparency, it is found out that the citizens enjoy impunity from all forms of discriminations that are faced by the non-citizens living and working in the country.
Citizens Over Non-citizens
Even though migrant workers hired for blue collar jobs and expatriates / foreigners working under white collar jobs substantially support the economy of the United Arab Emirates, they are subjected to discrimination and abuse.
The abuse is not generally physically, but impacts those targeted psychologically. The non-citizens working in the country have often been subjected to racial abuse, relatively lower wages, lesser opportunities, discriminated during promotions, etc. However, these matters have seldom made public by those affected by it. This is due to the fear of consequences that lead to going against a repressive regime like UAE.
An economy that is heavily reliant on low-paid migrant workers, has barely done anything in their welfare. Migration of a labor is controlled by the Kafala system in UAE, under which the foreign workers require permission from their sponsor (employer) to go back to their origin nation (homeland).
When UAE passed a few legal reforms in 2020, it eased some of the contractual limitations that fell under the Kafala system, easing it for the migrants. Under the reform, the Gulf nation defined minimum labor standards, introduced paid holidays, limited working hours, and prohibited child labor.
Nevertheless, this hasn’t stopped the regime from not abusing its migrants in the later months. According to the research conducted by DCT for its reporting on discrimination against foreigners and migrant workers, it was found out that the non-nationals feared being charged with fabricated criminal charges by their employer(s) or loss of their job for raising complaint against them. Therefore, such cases failed to come to light.
As one of the Middle East biggest host of migrant workers, UAE should own up to its responsibility of looking into the matter and resolve the issues in the welfare of its non-citizens.
