Senate Okays Bill, Seeking Protection for Domestic Workers, Employers
The Senate yesterday passed a bill seeking proper documentation and protection for domestic workers and their employers in the country.
The bill, when signed into law, will serve several purposes, including keeping full records of the identities of domestic workers.
It would also respect their fundamental human rights and safety of their employers.
The bill, sponsored by Senator Hussaini Babangida-Uba (Jigawa North-West), was titled: ‘A Bill for an Act to Provide for the Documentation and Protection of Domestic Workers and Employers and for other Matters Connected Therewith, 2024’.
Babangida-Uba told his colleagues that the bill would safeguard the interest of both the domestic worker and the employer by addressing recurring abuses and tragedies such as home helps killing their employers and disappearing with their valuables.
In Nigeria, he said, the absence of defined processes for recruiting domestic workers has led to such workers facing mistreatment, abuses and in many reported instances, tension between the parties resulting in the house helps resorting to criminality, including murder.
The Nigeria Police Force frequently warns Nigerians against indiscriminate recruitment of domestic workers in a bid to cut down the number of ugly incidents involving the workers and their employers.
Babangida-Uba, while leading the debate on the general principles of the bill, said most domestic workers in the country were unregistered and not supported by labour laws.
