Kenya’s parliament has proposed a Enterprise Legislation (Modification) Invoice 2024 to manage enterprise course of outsourcing (BPO) and IT-enabled service (ITES) corporations amid rising scrutiny of employee circumstances.
This follows a September 2024 courtroom ruling permitting BPO companies to be sued domestically. It was prompted by former Sama workers who alleged they have been moderating dangerous content material for shoppers like Meta underneath exploitative circumstances and with insufficient safeguards. Three Sama workers claimed in a single report that they have been underpaid at $2 per hour, far under the $12 proposed by enterprise companions.
The brand new invoice proposes that employers present all instruments mandatory for worker duties, no matter possession, and bars them from evading accountability by claiming they don’t seem to be direct service beneficiaries.
Whereas this might curb exploitation and align Kenya’s labour requirements with world norms, the proposed regulation raises issues, one industrial lawyer advised TechCabal. The invoice proposes that BPO companies ought to provide “mandatory instruments” for his or her workers and suggests inflexible legal responsibility provisions that would deter outsourcing giants cautious of elevated operational dangers and compliance prices, the identical lawyer mentioned.
“An employer who operates as a Enterprise Course of Outsourcing firm or who’s a supplier of Info Expertise Enabled Service shall be answerable for any declare raised by an worker in relation to the contract of service and shall not, in its defence to such declare, assert that it was not, in reality, the beneficiary of the companies of the worker,” a part of the invoice seen by TechCabal reads.
Sama beforehand offered content material moderation companies to Meta earlier than exiting the enterprise amid authorized disputes with over 180 former workers. These workers sued Sama for unfair dismissal and alleged that the corporate failed to guard them from the psychological toll of moderating dangerous on-line content material.
Sama has since stopped moderation operations and shifted focus to AI labeling companies for know-how giants resembling Microsoft, Google, and the e-commerce platform Walmart.
Meta can be being sued for an alleged algorithm that fueled ethnic violence in Ethiopia, one other lawsuit claims. Petitioners, represented by Mercy Mutemi of Nzili and Sumbi Advocates, are in search of to ban dangerous content material suggestions and set up a $1.6 billion sufferer fund.
Balancing employee rights with enterprise competitiveness is crucial, one other authorized skilled advised TechCabal. With out correct implementation, the invoice dangers stifling Kenya’s rising prominence within the world outsourcing trade, the skilled mentioned. Each Sama and Majorel have employed over 3,000 Kenyans.