NewStats: 3,264,452 , 8,183,757 topics. Date: Wednesday, 11 June 2025 at 07:16 AM w1z26

Haraj marketplace remains on Apple and Google stores despite UN slavery warning

She will work day and night and does not need rest, boasts Noura, a housewife in Riyadh. Gesturing to the cowering Ugandan maid next to her, who is 23 according to Noura, she adds: “If she does something wrong, you just send her to her room and do not let her out.”

Noura, who clutches gold Gucci sunglasses as she bargains for a price of £3,500 for the maid, is eager for a quick deal when she talks to an undercover Times reporter. “I can take her to your home tonight,” she says. “If you are still unsure, no problem, you can rent her instead . . . But tell me now, because by tomorrow someone else will buy her.”

Noura d the domestic worker on Haraj.sa, Saudi Arabia’s largest online marketplace, through which a Times investigation shows that hundreds of domestic workers are being illegally trafficked and sold to the highest bidders.

In a thinly disguised black market, dozens of listings are posted each day by Saudi citizens advertising migrant workers as available to buy or rent as maids, cleaners, nannies and drivers. Two hundred such listings have been seen by The Times.

The app, which had 2.5 million visits last year — more than Amazon or AliExpress within the kingdom — is still available on the Apple and Google Play stores despite being criticised by the UN’s Special Rapporteurs in 2020 for facilitating modern slavery.

In Saudi Arabia, which has the third largest migrant population in the world, foreign labourers are able to live and work through the Kafala system, where a Saudi citizen known as the “Kafeel” is legally responsible for the worker and will write up their contracts and the of their visa.

In the past year the government said that it had “reformed” the system as part of the 2030 Saudi Vision, a plan heralded as part of its attempt to open the country up to the world. It offered what were supposedly greater freedoms, including allowing workers to open bank s, move jobs and leave the country without permission.

However, the new freedoms only apply to those working in private sectors, such as oil and gas. Four million women and men working as domestic workers, farmers and drivers are still restricted.

Noura itted that she withheld her maid’s port in a safe for more than a year, from the day she first arrived through a recruitment agency in Uganda. The retention of workers’ identity documents is a violation of international human rights and is an indicator of forced labour and abuse, according to the UN.

Every seller who spoke to The Times itted they had been withholding their worker’s ports. Two itted to physically disciplining their workers if they “spoke back”, and dozens said they expected their maids to work day and night without breaks for as little as £5 a day.

When asked the reason for selling her maid, Noura said: “She is a good cleaner and cook, but she cannot look after my baby. My grandmother is sick so I need the money quickly.”

Others on the site said they were auctioning their maids for profit because they were “unfamiliar with children”, “unable to speak Arabic [or English]”, “unhygienic”, “stubborn” or because their “old [worker] has come back”.

The prices vary by ethnic background. Filipino maids sell fastest and for the highest prices, and Ugandan maids are labelled by some Haraj s as “the most stubborn” and “unclean” and selling for the least amount.

The hundreds of listings uncovered by the Times were often removed only a few days after being posted, because of the high demand for experienced workers. Noura told the undercover reporter the next evening that she had sold her maid to a higher, “more serious” bidder in the Saudi city of Abha.

The Labour Laws Awareness Initiative, a Kenyan-based helpline for domestic workers in the Middle East, said it received reports of Saudi sponsors illegally selling or renting their domestic workers without official permission “every single day”, as well as hundreds of calls each month from workers reporting abuse from their sponsors.

Valery Shebna, 30, a Kenyan maid, used the helpline for assistance to leave Saudi Arabia without her sponsors’ permission and returned to Nairobi this year. She said the family she lived with for two years in Riyadh beat her every day, refused to let her return home and withheld food as a form of discipline. “I came back emotionally scarred, and without my money, my port documents, my education certificates. All of that was kept by the couple — my bosses. They didn’t want me to leave.”

Equidem, a global human rights organisation which has a specialist team uncovering abuses experienced by domestic workers in Saudi Arabia, said the problem of trafficking maids in the kingdom had existed for decades but had recently become “akin to a humanitarian and moral crisis because of technology”.

Mustafa Qadri, its executive director, said: “Our grave fear, based on this Times investigation and our workers on the ground, is that there are hundreds, if not thousands, of such cases of online human trafficking, modern slavery, gender-based harm to workers in Saudi Arabia under the radar every day. That’s a really phenomenal scale — out of control.”

Qadri accused tech giants of “facilitating the exploitation of these workers through the technology supply chain”.

Apple said: “We strictly prohibit the solicitation or promotion of illegal behaviour, including human trafficking and child exploitation, in the App Store and across every part of our business. We take any accusations or claims around this behaviour very seriously.”

Google declined to comment. Haraj, Saudi Arabia’s human rights commission and the government have been ed for a response.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/maids-trafficked-and-sold-to-wealthy-saudis-on-black-market-dkl80kzgd?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1672066233

Arabs likes Slavery, they still leave in the past selling Humans as commodities. I have read about this story around a year or 2 years about this particular app. And this happened to a Nigerian Lady who was sold in Kuwait.

Arabs and slavery

Especially when you are black, those Arabs see you as a goat. They believe theor camel has more value and importance than you!


And the worst path, just criticize a little and they fast to send you back to God

Saudi Arabia is supposed to be the holy land of Islam, what’s the difference between this crime and drug trafficking? It’s obvious Muslim worship some demons they don’t even know how it came into existence.

Na hypocrisy go kill una.

Evil people

Hmmm.bad

Slavery

Black and some Asians don't have sense, they will come back home and start cheering for political thiefs who r responsible for their slavery.

Sigh

Those Arabs (Saudi's) have their way with anything they want and the West cannot sanction them.

Cus they're heavily owing the Arabians.

If na Poor country now.
Google would have taken down the App and sanctions imposed.
Amnesty International for don talk tey tey

Ecclesiastes 9:3

3 This is an evil among all things that are done under the sun, that there is one event unto all: yea, also the heart of the sons of men is full of evil, and madness is in their heart while they live, and after that they go to the dead.
Mankind is evil

There is nothing we can do about it. These Arabs are now super powerful. They can shut the world down just with a little of their policies so the west thread carefully. Saudi is already bidding to host the World Cup in 2030. They will use money and shut FIFA execs up.

We need to focus on Nigeria and Africa, and create our own power so that our youths will not continue to migrate to this countries to be slaves.

In Your Opinion, Who Do You Think Was Nigeria's Best-ever President?
https://gist.am/q/in-your-opinion-who-do-you-think-was-nigerias-best-ever-president

CoronaVirusRelo:
Arabs and slavery

Especially when you are black, those Arabs see you as a goat. They believe theor camel has more value and importance than you!

Caucasian, Arabs, Latinos , Negros, Jews, Asian , male, Female etc are all wicked.

Hmmm, na waoo

Slavery. A word cleverly used in this article to trigger a state of disgust and shock to the readers.

But if we think about it very carefully, aren't we in fact already all slaves?

Slaves to our leaders who continuously rape our collective wealth and watch us die in droves?

Slaves to countries who we are indebted to and in return must now dictate our economic policies?

Slaves to our religious leaders who use the holy book as a lethal weapon to plunder and desecrate our mental prowess and humanity in deference to their flawed understanding of the needs of an Almighty God.

I might digress from the article but this world is already filled with unspeakable horrors. The moment we realise that none of us is truly free, the faster we are to redemption.

27Pushing30:


Caucasian, Arabs, Latinos , Negros, Jews, Asian , male, Female etc are all wicked.

Where Arabs stand, those others you listed are learners!

I will never live in any head slamming country! No matter how juicy it is! That's the exact same reason I never spent a day in the north after my NYSC.

Islam as a religion always slavery. No matter what, and they are wicked even more than satan itself

I want to

Arab masters of African Muslims
Jews masters of African Christians

and e dey play store o

They are very rigid in of relationships. Na their way b dat

And the victims are from countries, so rich with natural resources enough to take care of the people but bad and evil leadership deny the people of such luxury. It will never be well with those evil African leaders and their families

Like their oga sold and Bought slaves now.. is it new to you people.. I blame us for allowing politicians sleep peacefully in this country. The resources we have will build 1000 Dubais but our politicians are scared the CIA will keel them like Gadafi .

Spaxon:
Those Arabs have their way with anything they want and re West cannot sanction them.

Exactly. When I opened the thread, the first I was looking out for was whether the app was still on playstote. Guess what, it is.

The west is hypocritical with it's brand of selective justice. Let it be Russia, it mobilise the whole world against it. See the way they chased abramhimovic yet they can't shut down a slavery app.

Slavery modernized

My girlfriend told me she was going to Dubai. Someone with zero skill. I knew it was definitely for prostitution. I didn't breakup. Once, once she sends me money. On Christmas day she sent me #250k. She can kee herself there if she wishes. I asked her what she did in Dubai, and she said cleaning. I pretented to believe her. Who am I not to?

EKONGKING:
Black and some Asians don't have sense, they will come back home and start cheering for political thiefs who r responsible for their slavery.

Especially those urchins ing APC and Tinubu

Man's inhumanity to his fellow man continues to befuddle even the devil.