When I say domestic workers, I am referring to the boys and girls, men and women working as house girls, houseboys, drivers, nannies, cooks, ‘maiguards’ and even the gardeners and washer men, in most homes in Nigeria.
The ‘house-help’, ‘domestic’ or ‘servant’ has become synonymous with most elite families in Nigeria. These workers work behind closed doors in private homes carrying out domestic chores including cleaning of rooms and furniture, washing of clothes and plates, preparation of food, running errands and escorting their employers’ children to and from school’.
What is most heart breaking and alarming is the relative preference for younger domestic workers due to them being considered more submissive and easier to direct around as compared to older domestic workers. Even more inhumane is the fact that majority of the domestic workers started between the ages of 9 and 14, with some starting as young as 5.
Words fail me in my attempt to explain the "housemaid" phenomena in Nigeria. It is indeed a reflection of the scriptures that state that the heart of man is desperately wicked, who can understand it.
These children are taken from their parents between the ages of 9 and 14 and as earlier stated even as young as 5 years old from the village or rural parts of the country to the city with the promise of taking good care of them, sending them to school and giving them a better life but the reverse is usually the case. These little children are exposed to untold hardship, measly fed, sent to schools way below the standard of the schools the children of their employers go to. Their sleeping conditions is usually an eyesore. The amount of work they do at such young age is extreme for 24hours. In the end, they still have to go to school, come back and continue from where they stopped while the children of their employers lay in their various rooms doing nothing.
I weep for the heart of humanity. I weep for the wickedness that man can perpetuate on another human. I weep for the height of selfishness and Man's inhumanity against Man. Am confused as to how we got here. This predicament has to stop and it begins with speaking up when we see wickedness. Enough of the "mind your business" when you could have saved a child from trauma and wickedness. Every child is your child
I look forwards to wonderful conversations in the comment section. Remain blessed guys.