Hundreds of female nannies have become homeless on the streets after the outbreak of the Covid-19 virus, and are starving in the rubble of the explosion last month in Lebanon.
In some of the videos posted, the world has seen life in Beirut freeze up due to the uncommon sound of the explosion, which shattered the entire city.
Among the videos, we saw one scene broadcast across the city, which is the scene of an African nanny instinctively taking the children out of harm's way and protecting them with her body.
In a report published by the British newspaper "The Guardian", writer Nisreen Malek said that more than a month has passed since the Beirut Port explosion, and the footage from that day is still horrific, such as its first appearance on television and social media platforms.
Female workers on the streets
The author stated that many of these nannies are currently sleeping in the streets of Beirut, and most of them are starving.
Even before the explosion, the economic crisis exacerbated by the Coronavirus pandemic forced Lebanese employers to lay off domestic workers because they were no longer able to pay their wages.
They collected their belongings, took them to the embassies of their countries, and expelled them from their homes.
Last June alone, more than 100 Ethiopian domestic workers were left outside the consulate of their home country, where they live on bags and share mattresses.
Some of them still try to stick to wearing masks even while sleeping on the unsanitary sidewalk.
Many workers sleep in the streets of Beirut, and most of them are starving (French)
Helping African women
The author indicated that last week she spoke to Christine, a nanny and housekeeper from West Africa - who did not want to give her real name for fear of retaliation from her employer - and said that she was trying to raise some money to help African women who were abandoned to return to their countries of origin.
But this task cannot be a priority.
Women sleeping on the streets need to eat in the first place.
If there is any money left, it will be spent on providing shelter for them.
In fact, travel from Lebanon to destinations in Africa is expensive, as the Golden Return Ticket is intended for patients who need to be with their families.
Christine considers herself one of the lucky ones because her "employer" did not abandon her, provided her with a place to live, and only cut her salary in half.
Even when they are ready to help, consulates must negotiate the maze of the Lebanese government bureaucracy, already notoriously infamous for its corruption and incompetence.
In order to secure the papers needed to leave, the Ministry of Labor charges exorbitant fees, and then there are the travel costs.
Ethiopian migrant workers are often asked to try to return to their employers, the author says.
Immigrant labor system
At the heart of this human rights crisis is the migrant labor system that continues to be a stigma in many countries of the Arab world, and which is known as kafala.
It effectively puts the workers' fate in the hands of employers, who often seize their passports to control them, then demand the return of fees paid to recruitment agencies in case workers want to leave before their contracts expire.
This is forcing some workers to flee, becoming undocumented.
The writer quoted Anna, a nanny from the Philippines, that she told her how she managed to escape from her abusive employer by wearing 3 sets of underwear, shirts and pants on top of each other.
This way, she was able to bring clothes with her without carrying a bag.
She had lost a lot of weight at that time, so she could wear a lot of clothes without arousing suspicion.
But she left everything behind, including her passport.
The cruelty of this sponsorship system is not an unfortunate result of bureaucracy, but rather the result of the racial hierarchy in which black workers find themselves at the bottom.
Of all the nationalities vying for a living in the Middle East and the wider Arab world, African women of color are the lowest paid, the most desperate and the most vulnerable to abuse.
Migrant workers in Lebanon suffer more, but African women suffer more (French)
The work is free of charge
Christine told the author that all migrant workers in Lebanon suffer, but African women suffer the most, as "they do not consider us human, and everyone ignores us. They consider us invisible."
In fact, employers who can no longer pay workers' salaries can sponsor and feed them housing, but choose not to do so, even though many domestic workers and nannies offer work for free.
As with any crisis, the most vulnerable are the most vulnerable.
Moreover, Lebanon is struggling with a corrupt and incompetent political class, and the crisis has deepened now after the explosion that would challenge the more powerful infrastructure.
Double suffering for female workers
According to the author, the scale of the reconstruction process Beirut is facing means that the hungry African women who sleep in harsh conditions in the streets of Beirut have become completely invisible: first by the Lebanese community that treats them as non-human, and secondly by the international community, which cannot determine more. The groups affected are among the many classes of victims in Lebanon.
Currently, migrant workers in Beirut are banding together and sharing whatever scarce resources they have.
They are also trying to warn others to stay away from this country.
Christine returns to express her fear that the workers will continue to come to Lebanon anyway, because they think they might be lucky. "When you are poor, all you think about is to try. We just want to try," she says.