To many Kenyans, unemployment is a custom. Whether one has meritoriously earned a PhD or never stepped into a class, the hopelessness is the same. It’s not uncommon to find placard holding graduates on the streets of major Kenyan cities desperately begging for opportunities or pushing cats, washing cars and cleaning toilets to earn a living.
This desperation has gone international, exposing them to foreign cartels who promise them opportunities and decent lifestyle in the gulf countries. Through Visa Sponsorship, they are promised jobs ranging home-making to transportation. Some are even introduced to “potential” entrepreneurs to help them Kickstart their business ventures.
Little do they know it’s a wider scheme to expose them to hell. One such country that has become synonymous with the abuse, and even heart-rending deaths of Kenyans is Saudi Arabia. Last week, the bodies of 12 Kenyans who died in the gulf country arrived in Nairobi, with saddened relatives and friends hitting out at the state for neglegence.
But the government denied the allegations, arguing Kenyans must follow the right channels when visiting foreign countries.
“The death of a Kenyan abroad, irrespective of the circumstances, is always a concern to the Ministry, both at the headquarters and to our embassies on the ground,” Kenya’s foreign affairs ministry said in a statement seen as avoiding a diplomatic gaffe with Saudi Arabia.
“It’s a standard practice that Kenyans traveling abroad for work or other reasons take medical or other insurance for the duration of their stay abroad to cater for various emergencies including sickness and death.” The statement added.
Kenyans in Saudi Arabia have narrated their untold suffering as sexual violence, torture, murder and lack of payment.
“What’s going on in the gulf countries is something I wouldn’t want even my worst enemy to go through. What joblessness has done to this country will take a century to undo.” Said Simiyo Wasike who returned to the country through well-wishers after his prospect of a good life in Saudi Arabia hit a snag.
Unemployment rate in Kenya currently stands at 2.98% according to a 2020 statistics by the Government of Kenya. Coupled with 1.7 million that have lost their jobs since the Advent of COVID-19, the country faces an unimagined crisis.
