BEIRUT—On a May morning last year, Rosemary Nyambura fled the Lebanese household where she had worked as a maid for nearly a year, leaving behind her passport, which her employer had confiscated.
But the 25-year-old Kenyan’s departure from one household—where she said she had suffered abuse—led to another traumatic chapter as a domestic worker in Lebanon.
Last month, a massive blast at Beirut’s port showered Ms. Nyambura with dust and glass in the home of a fellow Kenyan who had hosted her since she left her job, and left her stranded on the street, still without a passport and without a means to return to Kenya.
The plight of migrant workers such as Ms. Nyambura has exposed the inequities of a labor system at the heart of the economies of Lebanon and much of the Middle East.
The sponsorship system, known as kafala, ties a work visa and residency permit to an individual employer. It gives the employer immense control over a worker’s fate by determining if and when the worker can return home. In many cases, workers’ passports are confiscated.