THE KAFALA SYSTEM

By Manaal Khwaja

Last year in April, a Kuwaiti woman recorded her Ethiopian maid clinging onto a window, then falling from the seventh floor while the maid called for help. This video gained a large amount of attention globally and in Kuwait. The maid fortunately only suffered a minimal amount of injuries, and the employer was jailed, but these actions are representative of a larger social ill plaguing the Gulf states and the greater Middle East. Migrant workers are systematically and socially dehumanized. Obviously, this employer’s inhumane actions do not categorize all Kuwaitis or the Middle East. There was an enormous amount of social media backlash from the region, and the Kuwaiti Society for Human Rights called for an official investigation of the incident. However, the employer’s actions in the video display how extreme dehumanization can be, and how dangerous it is. Even with public condemnation, the mistreatment of migrant workers continues in the region, and it is permitted legally through the kafala system.

The kafala system is a sponsorship program through which unskilled workers can enter the country if they have a sponsor, which is usually the employer. Through that relationship, the worker earns a visa and legal status. However, these sponsorship relationships often lead to exploitation. It is not uncommon for employers to take away their employee’s passport (not allowing them to leave), pay them unlivable wages, and force inhumane conditions upon them (long work days, inadequate housing, physical abuse, and general mistreatment). Such exploitation has become a backbone of economic structures in the region.

This legal system allows for the exploitation of migrants, mainly from South and Southeast Asia as well as parts of Africa. 23 million workers are affected in the countries of Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Although each country has its own specific regulations dictating the implementation of the system, the overarching purpose is to monitor migrant laborers who work primarily in the construction and domestic sectors. This system has been criticized as being modern slavery, and in many aspects it is.

The kafala system is not an overtly discriminatory system since workers are promised a contract that binds both the employer and employee. In practice, however, the contract is rarely followed by employers, nor does it have to include agreements that benefit the employee. Migrant workers don’t receive much judicial protection either, and there are no laws discouraging employers from mistreating workers. In fact, certain countries’ labor laws, such as Qatar and Lebanon, specifically exempt migrant workers from protection under the law against wage inequality, discrimination, and from paternal leave. Consequently, the migrant is bound to the kafel (sponsor), depending on them for full economic and social status.

This system further establishes a racial hierarchy and order through the continuation of colonial systems and values. Certain ethnicities (such as South and Southeast Asians and Africans) associated with migrant work are viewed as inferior. Migrant workers are considered to be at the bottom of society due to racist and classist beliefs that were exacerbated by colonialism. Such beliefs permit the continuation of the kafala system and ensure that progressive movements to change the system are hindered by social prejudices.

There has been increased discourse and pressure to alter this system, especially in the wealthier nations that currently use it. Right now, Qatar has promised to abolish the system by 2020, in time for the World Cup. The United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Kuwait have all also stated they aim to end this system. However, there is little evidence that reforms are underway, and what alterations have been made still permit abuse.

It is not possible for the kafala system to fully be abolished until social attitudes within these nations change. Currently, these states depend upon and have developed around low labor costs. As a result, completely recreating the economic system requires a large social component; one that recognizes human life as valuable and not just as a tool.

AN UNCONVENTIONAL TOOL OF WAR

By Daisye Rainer

In the Middle East, water is potentially the greatest weapon a state can have. The region has for decades experienced the effects of water scarcity, which has been exacerbated by a multitude of factors such as climate change and poor agricultural practices. But no factor bears the most influence on water insecurity than the region’s political conflicts.

First, populations in the Middle East are heavily dependent upon agriculture to survive and meet basic needs. In his book Farming Systems and Food Security in Africa, John Dixon calculated that approximately 70% of those living in rural areas rely on agriculture alone, and Alexandra Barton estimated that water withdrawals for farming account for 85% of total water withdrawals across the region.

But in reality, this water insecurity impacts much more than the 84 million farmers in the Middle East dependent upon water for irrigation to survive. Water is the root of so much of our world, and its decline will affect all populations in the future. For example, a lack of water harms major water-using sectors, like manufacturing, energy, and construction, which won’t be able to satisfy consumer needs and will see a decline in profit. Water, then, is crucial to not simply a country’s agricultural sector but its entire economy. And with a declining availability of water for a dependent population, it has become a tool of war.

The scarcity of the resource has increased tension among competing neighboring states, with conflict arising particularly among states who share a body of water, like the Jordan River, and has resulted in geographical and political disputes. Historically, these states have competed for water by diverting from the source at extreme rates, leading to political conflict and in even some cases, war.

But recently, the rise of extremist groups—namely ISIS—has severely impacted water security in the Middle East. Syria and Iraq present the most telling illustrations of water’s influence on political stability and politics’ influence on water security. Water here has been targeted, sequestered, and seized as means of political intimidation and deprivation. According to Globalist author Markus Heinrich and People author Lisdey Espinoza Pedraza, ISIS has launched multiple offensives since 2014 to conquer Syrian and Iraqi dams that hold enough water to sustain their respective populations. CNN also reported that ISIS-inflicted violence in Mosul, Iraq against Iraqi-led militant groups in 2016 led to the destruction of a major water line in the city, depriving half a million civilians of water. In extreme cases such as these, humanitarian aid cannot transport enough water for the millions of people affected. Political unrest and conflict have also displaced many people in the past decade, which, according to Phillip Connor of Pew, has almost doubled the number of migrants in the region and further imposed pressure and stress on the water scarcity issue.

The Middle East, especially Iraq and Syria, will continue to feel the effects of water insecurity as long as political tension exists in the region. Any direct action to combat the political groups would only aggravate conflict and possibly instigate violence against civilians. For this reason, solving this issue is a challenge: we must both seek policy solutions to safeguard the availability of water through measures such as water management reform and wrest the control of water from extremist groups who have sought to deprive their victims of earth’s most important resource.

THE ONGOING LGBTQ+ RIGHTS CRISIS IN MALAYSIA

By Landon Holben

For each step forward that the LGBTQ+ community and its allies make, there is almost always a counterexample that shows the world is still as dangerous a place as ever for the community. Recently, a constitutional referendum vote to explicitly limit same-sex marriage was struck down before it even reached the voting stage in Romania. Yet just a month before, world news headlines described the horrific public caning and fining of two homosexual women in Malaysia. The LGBTQ+ rights crisis is a human rights crisis and should be treated as such, especially in regions such as Southeast Asia where the community is often helpless in the face of state-sponsored homophobia and discrimination.

The punishment of the two women took place in Terengganu, a state to the east of Malaysia’s capital, Kuala Lumpur. The state is known to be governed by Sharia law, including special courts specifically for Muslims. Each woman was lashed six times after being caught attempting to have sex in a parked car. They were also required to pay a fine of 3,300 ringgits ($800) each. This punishment was carried out within a courtroom with many public observers. Current Malaysian anti-sodomy law, largely unchanged since 1826, provides for whipping and up to a 20-year prison sentence for homosexual acts.

On September 22, 2018, Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, the current head of government in Malaysia, responded to criticisms made by The Human Rights Coalition of Malaysia (Suhakam) by stating that LGBT rights and same-sex marriages were unacceptable in Malaysia due to its status as a Muslim-majority nation. That same day, Suhakam itself announced that they also do not support same-sex marriage, despite their championing of the universality of human rights and criticisms of the Malaysian government’s human rights record. This is a common theme in Malaysia, as many organizations criticize discrimination and violence against the LBGT+ community, yet maintain the stance that members of the community are going against Islam and need to return to the “right” path. Since the mid-1970’s Malaysia has been undergoing a period of Islamization, in which the government has set traditional Islam on a crash course with constitutional law. Anti-sodomy laws were rarely enforced in Malaysia through most of the 20th century, yet the politically-charged persecution of the former parliamentary Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim has now set the nation well behind many of its Southeast Asian counterparts. Anwar was first charged and jailed in 1998 before the verdict was overturned in 2004. Charges were brought again in 2008, but after trials in 2010, 2011, and 2012 he was acquitted. The Malaysian Court of Appeal overturned this acquittal in 2014, sentencing Anwar to five years in prison, which he served until his pardon on May 16, 2018. It can be argued then, that discrimination has worsened in recent years due to a combination of stricter government adherence to traditional Islam and the public discrediting of Anwar. The general population of Malaysia is being held back from learning to accept progress for the LGBTQ+ community due to the current administration’s reliance upon traditional Islam as the basis for the law.

Singapore, another nation that inherited its laws against homosexuality from the British Empire, began to review these laws throughout the last decade, essentially leading the government to declare that private acts between consenting adults would not be prosecuted. This, coupled with a dramatic rise in public acceptance for same-sex relationships over the last five years, presents a promising outlook for Singapore’s future with human rights. This goes to show that if the government is willing to lessen discrimination laws, the general public will often follow suit. This is also the case in India, which legalized homosexuality on September 6, 2018, a decision that has enjoyed support from a majority of the general population.

The case could be similar in Malaysia if the government were to lessen their support for discrimination, as India especially is a deeply traditional and religious country, much like Malaysia. The Malaysian government, however, has publicly defended human rights epidemics such as child marriage as being a lesser problem than LGBTQ+ activity. The government has also contributed directly to the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the nation by limiting public advertisement of condom-usage and treatment options. Malaysia is seventh highest in adult prevalence of HIV/AIDS in all of Asia, and even current government programs to curve the upward trend are ineffective due to the widespread discrimination and social stigmata around HIV/AIDS. This trend, which affects far more than just the LGBTQ+ community, could be reversed with government intervention and the allowance of resources to change social perspectives and combat the disease.