New documentary highlights travails of domestic assistants

The documentary titled Nigeria Domestic Report, the brain child of Mariacutty Empowerment Foundation features young men and women who have been trapped by poverty in the thankless job of providing important service in homes as nannies, cleaners, washermen, security men and drivers among others recounting their ordeals in the course of their jobs. Many of […]

The documentary titled Nigeria Domestic Report, the brain child of Mariacutty Empowerment Foundation features young men and women who have been trapped by poverty in the thankless job of providing important service in homes as nannies, cleaners, washermen, security men and drivers among others recounting their ordeals in the course of their jobs.

Many of the domestic assistants who were featured in the 15 minutes documentary said they took up such jobs because they lacked other alternatives as they are too poor to pursue their dreams in life.

Founder of Mariacutty Empowerment foundation, Mariam Aliko Mohammed, said she was moved to take up the task of enlightening people on the important roles domestic assistants play due the culture of neglect and abuse that has characterised the profession in several countries of the world and Nigeria in particular.

She explained that her foundation is trying to regularise the domestic services sector by advocating for a curriculum and a system whereby domestic assistant could be trained on different aspect of the industry and employed as professionals commanding a decent pay.

According to her, the programme tagged Mariacutty EVOLVE will have several agencies including Life Impact Foundation International (LIFI) and the Red Cross and other organisations catering to the training and placement of such domestic assistants.

The programme, she explained will cater for the interest of employees of domestic assistants by making sure they get value for money by furnishing them with competent service providers as well as ensure that the domestic assistants are treated with respect and earn a decent wage.

“This is not something we should take lightly, because we are here and our children are at home with the maids. You don’t know what is happening right now in your house with the kids, but the maid does,” she said.

To demonstrate this point, Emamakpo Uruetse of LIFI said they had handled a case in which a maid had had three siblings sharing the same toothbrush for quite a while resulting in one of the children contracting the HIV virus.

She also said that research has shown that a huge number of women in the sex industry trace their roots to the domestic services industry and have now been exposed to the HIV virus. Her agency will be coming in to provide HIV training and other aspects concerning health and healthy practices.

The Training Officer of the Nigerian Red Cross Joy Idara, who represented the organisation’s secretary general, said they are coming in to train domestic assistants on handling emergencies and providing basic first aids because they are mostly the ones around when emergency situations arise.

Balkisu Magoro, who also spoke at the event, made an impassioned plea to the government, other NGOs and the general public to support the moves to regulate the sector and improve the lives of everyone involved.