This crisis has lifted the veil on the problem of securing citizens working in “dangerous” places.
This past week, panic has gripped East Africans in the Middle East as Lebanon came under a hail of fire from Israel and tensions between Tel Aviv and Iran reached a crescendo.
The Kenyan government has been struggling to get its nationals to register for evacuation, as some are locked inside compounds by their employers.
This crisis has lifted the veil on the problem of securing citizens working in “dangerous” places.
The Lebanon crisis emerged just after Kenya signed a labour export agreement with Germany, allowing the European country to tap the available skilled labour in Kenya to plug its ageing workforce.
President William Ruto sees this as a way of dealing with spiralling unemployment.
In Nairobi, officials admit that this policy is double-edged not just in Lebanon or Saudi Arabia but in new frontiers such as Myanmar, where hundreds of East Africans have been rescued over the past four years from bondage.
As hundreds of people complained, via social media, of being abandoned in Lebanon, some 12 Kenyans filed an SOS seeking to be rescued from Myanmar, which has been under military rule over the past three years.
Sources said some intermediaries, an NGO in Thailand and another in Kenya, were helping negotiations with a UN agency to help rescue them.
The alarm came just three days after five Kenyans were released from bondage in Myanmar. Thai authorities then charged them with violating immigration laws there.
According to Ministry of Foreign and Diaspora Affairs, these Kenyans had gone there against government policy and reportedly had to pay ransom to be freed.
An official in Nairobi said a family approached the ministry last week to have their kin rescued. The EastAfrican is not naming the family because they are involved in tricky talks to free their family member.
“We estimate that 100 more Kenyans are inside the compounds, and some don’t even want to be rescued,” said an official involved in the discussions.
On Friday, Nairobi said it had banned any labour exports to Myanmar and Lebanon and warned Kenyans against travelling there.
Labour Cabinet Secretary Dr Alfred Mutua said the government was making improvements on how it responds to distress calls.
“We will deploy an additional labour attaché to Jeddah (Saudi Arabia) to assist Kenyans who find themselves in distressing situations. We have a toll-free number managed by National Employment Authority 24/7 that Kenyans can call for government assistance from wherever they are i.e. 020800222223,” he said.
Saudi Arabia is the other country where East Africans have been caught in modern slavery after going there for domestic work. Nairobi said it was negotiating a labour pact to focus on skilled manpower.
“All private recruitment agencies have been vetted afresh, and only those that appear in black ink on the NEA (National Employment Authority) portal have been approved. Those in red ink should be avoided,” Dr Mutua told The EastAfrican, adding new job spheres will include pre-departure education on local culture at destination.
“We are pursuing other BLAs (bilateral labour agreements) with other Western European countries where foreign labour is required due to the ageing population in these countries. We've signed one with Germany and Austria. Pursuing Canada, Serbia, Russia, and UK for professional skilled labour.”
Kenya's role has recently gone beyond just responding to distress calls. The Ministry said it had worked with Thai authorities to rescue 141 Africans, including 108 Kenyans, 19 Ugandans, 11 Ethiopians, a Burundian, a Zimbabwean and a Senegalese.
“We frequently see job advertisements on social media claiming to offer positions in customer care, translation, and IT in Thailand. However, the Kenyan embassy has repeatedly warned that these jobs are fake, created by traffickers,” Roseline Njogu, the Principal Secretary for Diaspora told The EastAfrican.
“Kenyans must prioritise their security by seeking accurate information. If you have questions about job offers in Thailand, Australia or Poland, our embassy can help verify their legitimacy. We have a dedicated department for this purpose. Please reach out to us before risking your safety.”
Most job seekers, however, don’t use formal channels. In Kenya, some leave the country via neighbouring countries, choosing Entebbe airport for most of the trips out, and taking advantage of the porous borders.
These countries do not have diplomatic relations with Myanmar, whose junta does not control the areas the labourers are taken. But most of these African countries also don’t have embassies in Thailand, leaving Kenyato their rescue.
The 141 Africans were rescued with the help of Thai authorities, Laos government, the International Organisation for Migration, Interpol in Thailand and Myanmar and various NGOs that had contacts with the cartels.
Yet the flow of more Africans into Myanmar points to a lucrative business. In July, Kenya’s embassy in Thailand warned that there were no jobs in Myanmar.
Some of those sending their compatriots there are Kenyans who had themselves been trafficked. Officials listed scammer recruiters identified online such as Taichang Park, a group controlled by Democratic Karen Budhist Army (DKBA), which was holding 10 Kenyans.
Another was KK4 PARK controlled by the Border Force (BGF), holding 18 Africans and which also controls another group, KK-3 Park, based in Myawaddy, Myanmar, with 20 African workers.
Space X KTV aka Hengsheng Complex, also controlled by DKBA, was holding two Kenyans. There was another group holding four Kenyans but its name was not immediately shared.
These groups are controlled by Chinese cartels and run their operations in areas controlled by rebels fighting the junta.
Their task is to front Africans fluent in English, French and other languages to scam people online, as well as lure them into servitude – working 18 hours a day, according to Thai authorities. Those who lure the victims reportedly earn between Ksh200,000 and Ksh800,000 ($1,550 -$6,200), but the victims often arrive to learn they have fake visas.
The hiring, however, begins in Nairobi, with job seekers believing they are heading for Dubai, only for details to change to Bangkok, before they are lured into Myanmar overland, crossing the border using illegal routes, according to Thai investigators.
Myanmar is not the only place Kenyans have been scammed, however. Experts say cases are rising as the government searches for opportunities abroad for the youth and plug unemployment problems Kenya.
Davis Nyagah, an immigrant legal consultant in Nairobi, said governments are killing two birds with one stone: raising remittances while reducing joblessness. But he warned that there are loopholes that need to be plugged.
“We cannot ignore the policy difficulties posed by migration, but neither should we lose sight of its immense potential to benefit migrants, the countries they leave and those to which they migrate,” he told The EastAfrican.
“Developing countries are demanding more open policies. They view migration as offering an opportunity to reduce the ranks of the unemployed, earn revenue through the remittance of workers’ earnings, and import skills, knowledge and technology via returning residents.
"Yet they are also concerned about losing skilled workers to richer countries, a process referred to as the brain drain. Aware of the detrimental effect of such migration, some have introduced measures to reduce the departure of people whose skills are needed, such as doctors and nurses.”
Yet migration, he argued, comes with an element of human security, which requires that governments address labour exports as a whole-of-government project where the left hand knows what the right is doing, while also ensuring employer organisations, industry bodies and businesses, unions, civil society organisations, migrant representations and diaspora organisations work together.
East African countries have benefited from diaspora remittances, in some cases exceeding their main exports, raising earnings to $9.3 billion, according to a World Bank report.
Kenya, for example, earned $4.2 billion from the diaspora in the Gulf and Western countries in 2023.
In Germany last month, President Ruto admitted that rogue agents were involved in recruiting people into slavery.
“We want to avoid unlicensed people operating in this space,” he said on September 14 at a roundtable on labour mobility in Berlin.
“The ministry of labour through (minister) Alfred Mutua has clear instructions from the government of Kenya is not to have any recruiting agent that is not licensed. Those that are not doing the right doing know the consequences. We want to ensure that the process is corruption free and that it benefits the people that we are targeting,” Dr Ruto said.