Layla Quran
Adalah Center for Human Rights Studies
Amman, Jordan
On a sunny Friday morning a few weeks ago, I shared a taxi with Joy, a Filipina domestic worker living in downtown Amman. The streets were quiet, as Friday is a day off for most residents of Jordan’s capital city. And for many domestic workers in Amman, Friday is a day of gathering; a time when they can take a break from their often arduous schedules and come together as a community.
We were headed to a meeting for the Domestic Workers Solidarity Network, Jordan’s first domestic workers’ rights group founded and led solely by domestic workers. As we entered the Jordanian Women’s Union office, we could hear the excited chatter of women as the meeting set to begin. Domestic workers from the Filipino, Bengali, Sri Lankan, Indonesian, and Ethiopian communities in Amman gathered around breakfast pastries and coffee before settling into their seats in the meeting room.
The main topic of discussion for the meeting was the structure of the Network, including a discussion of what it means to be a member of the Network, setting of bylaws, and how to expand the group in the future. Questions raised included if the group should include undocumented domestic workers, and workers who may have started as domestic workers but now work in another field. Workers chimed in on how they want the Network to look in the future.
At the end of the meeting, workers formed a line behind a small table where a lawyer from the Adaleh Center for Human Rights advised each worker on legal issues they were facing. The lawyer answered questions from workers about how to obtain confiscated passports from employers, best steps to follow in dealing with abusive employers, and how to legally leave Jordan to return to their home countries. Although many of the workers were in challenging situations, they knew they had legal rights in the country that were meant to protect them, and they took the initiative to be at the Network meeting to demand their rights as workers.