Protection of the employment rights of female adolescent domestic workers in Kampala City, Uganda

Abstract

The analysis of the legal and policy protection of domestic workers’ employment rights has been a growing stream of research at the global level since the early 18th century. This research has, however, concentrated on advocating for this protection and examining the adequacy of the laws and policies that provide for it. The effectiveness of these laws and policies has not attracted much research, especially in the context of Adolescent Female Domestic Workers (AFDWs). The aim of this study was hence to analyse this effectiveness based on AFDWs in Kampala City. The study was guided by three objectives, which included: (1) analysing the effectiveness of the legal and policy instruments enacted to protect employees’ workplace rights in the context of AFDWs in Kampala City; (2) exploring the factors hindering the effectiveness of these legal and policy instruments in the context of these AFDWs; and (3) proposing remedies to factors hindering the effectiveness of the legal and policy instruments enacted to protect employees’ workplace rights in the context of these AFDWs. The study was conducted using a descriptive research design involving a qualitative socio-legal research approach to data collection and analysis. Sociological primary data was collected from a sample of 35 purposively selected study participants who included 15 AFWDs and 10 AFDW employers selected from ten households identified in Nakawa Division using snowball sampling, and 10 officials working in the different state organs and government agencies concerned with enacting and implementing a legal framework for protecting employees’ rights. This data was collected using face-to-face interviews guided on an interview guide, and analysed using Yin’s (2015) framework of thematic analysis. Secondary legal data was collected and analysed using doctrinal analysis of relevant legal instruments and records. The study’s key findings indicate that the legal and policy framework in place in Uganda to guarantee domestic workers’ enjoyment of their employment rights did not achieve its purpose and was hence not effective in the context of the large majority of AFDWs in Kampala City. The factors that hindered this effectiveness included: AFDWs’ and their employers’ unawareness of not only these workers’ employment rights but also the justice seeking steps to follow when the rights are violated and its dispensing agencies. The hindrances also included the constitutional privacy of AFDWs’ workplace; state reluctance resulting from legislative omission of housemaids’ plight, lawmakers’ reluctance to legislate against themselves and lack of political will; and inadequate express legal protection for these workers’ employment rights resulting from lack of specific legal provisions and policy regulations on these rights. The proposed remedies to these constraints included: sensitising AFDWs and their employers about their employment rights; raising AFDWs’ awareness of how to seek justice when their employment rights are violated and of the agencies dispensing this justice. The remedies also included allocating identification numbers to permanent homes in Uganda; making the homes hiring domestic workers lawfully accessible; and government’s demonstration of political will to introduce the law and policy guidelines on domestic work by ratifying and domesticating C189. The remedies further included elimination of legislative omission by prioritising domestic workers’ plight instead of serving self-interest. From the findings, the study concluded by emphasising the need to make Uganda’s legal framework for protecting employment rights effective in doing so for all AFDWs who are legally permitted to work. Following this conclusion, the study recommended to the Executive to initiate a bill and policy providing for employment rights of domestic workers by ratifying and domesticating C189. It also recommended to the Parliament of Uganda to enact and pass the initiated bill and policy. The study further recommended sensitisation of not only AFDWs’ employers about the employment rights of these workers and how to observe and respect them but also the AFDWs to know these rights, how to seek justice and from which agencies when the rights are violated.