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Kenyan President Enters Meta Courts

CA Big Tech company will be sued in Kenya for alleged harassment at the outsourcing company it works for?

That's the question at the heart of two lawsuits that are trying to set a new precedent in Kenya, a prime location for tech companies seeking to cultivate digital jobs on the African continent.

The two-year legal dispute stems from allegations of human rights abuses at the Meta content screening center in Nairobi, where contractors were paid as little as $1.50 an hour to view disturbing content, such as videos of rape, murder, and war crimes. The lawsuits allege that despite the fact that the workers were contracted by an outsourcing company, called Sama, Meta oversees and sets the goals of the work, designs and manages the software required for the work. Both companies deny the charges and Meta has challenged the jurisdiction of the Kenyan courts to hear the cases. But the court ruled in September that the cases could proceed individually. Both are set to go on trial next year, unless the High Court of Kenya intervenes.

Read more: Inside Facebook's African Sweatshop

Meta declined to comment on ongoing litigation. The Samas did not respond to requests for comment. It previously called the allegations “inaccurate and disappointing.”

If successful, the lawsuits could set a new precedent in Kenyan law that Big Tech companies — not just their outsourcing partners — are legally responsible for any wrongdoing that occurs within subcontracted facilities. Proponents say this will improve workers' rights and avoid exploitative work in Kenya's data-labelling sector, which is growing due to the growing demand for AI training data. But opponents argue that such a decision would make Kenya an unattractive place for foreign companies to do business, which could result in job losses and hinder economic development.

To show the importance of these cases, Kenyan president William Ruto entered the debate on Monday. In an event held at the city hall in Nairobi, Ruto said he was preparing to sign a bill which he said would prevent money-lending companies from being sued in Kenya in the future. “Those people were taken to the courts, and they had a big problem,” Ruto said, referring to Sama, a company that hires people directly from Facebook. “They really confused me. Now I can inform you that we have changed the law, so no one will take you to court again for any matter.” Ruto said the Sama planned to move to Uganda “because most of us were bothering them.” And he pitched the change in the law as an attempt to make Kenya an attractive destination for companies that are sending money, such as India or the Philippines, to bring much-needed jobs to the country.

The truth is more complicated than Ruto makes it sound. There is a bill in the Kenyan Senate that would change the employment law as it relates to the outsourcing industry. But that bill will not, as Ruto says, prevent money-lending companies from being sued. On the contrary: its text rather expressly prohibits companies issuing money clients – for example large technology companies such as Meta or OpenAI – in entering the cases of their contractors in Kenya. Kenya's Senate majority leader, who authored the bill, said in an X-post that the proposed change would “greatly benefit the growing number of unemployed youth” in the country, arguing that it would make Kenya better. an attractive place to do business without undermining its workplace protections. “The players in the industry insist that if we want to achieve our full potential, this is their request to us as a country,” he said, without elaborating on which companies have applied for the law to be changed. (He did not respond to a request for comment. “Meta has not communicated that there has been a change in these rules,” a company spokesperson said in a statement sent to TIME. Ruto's office did not respond to a request for comment.)

Proponents of the lawsuits disagree. “This idea that economic development can only come from exploitation, must die,” said Mercy Mutemi, a lawyer leading the cases against Meta and Sama at the law firm Nzili and Sumbi Advocates, and the UK tech Justice non-profit. Foxglove. “One hundred percent, let's find more jobs for young people. But it does not mean that they should do these jobs in an exploitative way. There is a way to achieve both.”

Read more: Meta Failed to Escape Labor Exploitation Case in Kenya

If the cases against Meta continue to be heard and the courts decide in favor of the plaintiffs, Ruto may face a political headache. “The President ran on a platform of economic reforms,” ​​said Odanga Madung, a Nairobi-based independent technology analyst and former Mozilla colleague who has studied the country's outsourcing industry. “Court cases are against it [outsourcing] the sector hinders him from achieving his political goals. In fact, he is telling Kenyan youth that court cases like the one against Meta are a threat to their future, which they are trying to protect. It is very important to look closely at that political situation.”

The Kenyan charges were brought after a 2022 TIME investigation revealed that young Africans were being recruited across the continent for what some believed were Sama call center positions, only to find themselves overseeing graphic Facebook content. The story described how many of them developed PTSD, and how some were fired after advocating for better working conditions and organizing a strike. The lawsuits allege human rights violations, labor violations, discrimination, human trafficking, unfair dismissal, and intentional harm to mental health. Both companies deny these allegations, while Meta also argues that it was not the direct employer of the moderator.

Although Ruto's political intervention may prevent anything from happening, it does not seem likely to have a direct impact on the proceedings against Meta, said Mutemi. He says this is because the cases deal with human rights violations rather than simple employment claims, and are therefore protected under Kenya's constitution, and can continue regardless of changes to employment law. “We agree that the law needs to be amended to reflect new categories of work, for example the gig economy and speaker work,” said Mutemi. “However, the bill currently in parliament does not protect workers. In fact, it seems to prioritize the protection of [outsourcing companies] and technology companies for abusing workers' rights.”


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