18/01/2021
Driven to despair: Male domestic workers in Saudi | Migrant-Rights.org
A er the lockdowns were li ed in June, Harith returned to work again but his employers want him to continue living
with his cousin for the foreseeable future.
Harith has been fortunate to nd a substitute accommodation, but shi ing into an already cramped apartment in the
middle of the pandemic is risky.
“...if I would have tested positive and have had to go under quarantine, I could have lost my job.”
A survey in May revealed that 77% of individuals who tested positive- for COVID-19 were non-Saudi residents. One
likely factor for the disproportionate impact on migrants is the very densely populated apartment complexes and
neighbourhoods that house many low-wage migrants.
And although employers are legally obligated to provide healthcare to domestic workers, and though Saudi Arabia
provides free COVID-19 testing and treatment for everyone including undocumented residents, uncertainties and lack
of access to information still create an obstacle to medical care.
Job losses across sectors and remote working have also impacted male domestic workers and drivers of private
households in particular. Mahmoud,* a 30-year-old from Pakistan, works in Mecca and used to ferry his employer’s
wife to work and back.
“I was driving for one family for the past four years and have been in Saudi Arabia for the past ten. My main job was
driving my employer’s wife to and from her work, which was located in Jeddah, ve days a week. I haven’t had any
work since late March because she wasn’t going to work any longer and everything else in Mecca was also in
lockdown. They paid me in full for March but for April and May, they paid just SR500 (of the contracted SR2700) and
said that I wasn’t working but they know I support my family back home so they wanted to support me in that.”
He was told that July would be his last working month.
Hassan F, 30 from India, works as a security guard for a Saudi family living in Mecca. He says he had a fever for two
weeks straight through April and even though he wanted to get tested, his employers would only give him three
Paracetamol tablets to take a day to suppress his fever and ask him to continue doing his job.
“I worked fewer hours and they said I could rest whenever I needed to but they said that there was no need to go to the
hospital unless I was feeling extremely sick,” he says. “And if I would have tested positive and have had to go under
quarantine, I could have lost my job.”
Many men working as domestic workers who have lost their jobs and are awaiting repatriation ights say that their
embassies are not prioritising their concerns.
“Embassies prioritise families and unmarried women because their concerns are highlighted more and if they su er,
the media back home talks about it more,” says Dawood, when asked if he had considered seeking help from his
embassy. “I don’t think people know that most domestic workers here are drivers and we are all men, I think.”
“I am planning to move back to Pakistan – the situation here is very bad and the taxes are too high now. I keep calling
the embassy [consulate] and even visited once but they didn’t let me in and said that I need an appointment. I want a
ight back home as early as possible because it is too expensive to continue living here,” says Mahmoud.
*Some names changed to protect identities
Photo Credit: Francisco Anzola (For illustrative purposes only)
By Rabiya Jaffery
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