Anti-Slavery International's South Asia Programme Co-ordinator Krishna Prasad Upadhyaya, reviews the situation of bonded labour in Nepal and reports on recent progress in bonded labourers' fight for justice.

Ever since the Government of Nepal declared all bonded labourers free in 2000, they have struggled for support, assistance as well as for their freedom. Following that historic declaration, thousands of kamaiya* agricultural bonded labourers in the country's Western District were forced from their homes and left without food or shelter.

With no protection in law -- the Government's proclamation did not make using bonded labour an offence -- and no land of their own or means of livelihood, the kamaiya were forced to live by roadsides, in forests and makeshift camps. Exposed to disease, hunger and violence from landlords and officials, government promises of relief failed to materialise and local NGOs struggled to provide tents, rice, medicines and other related relief work.

The passing of the Kamaiya Labour (Prohibition) Act two years later provided the legal framework necessary to ensure they could live free and independent lives. Under the law, the Government was required to provide housing, employment and income-generating activities to certain groups of kamaiya.

Despite some progress being made at the time, full implementation of the law still has not been achieved. An estimated 40 per cent of freed kamaiya have yet to receive all of the support measures they are entitled to, and many people remain in bondage.

Despite frequent assurances, progress has been repeatedly thwarted. This has been in part due to numerous crises that have diverted attention away from the kamaiya's needs, including a long standing conflict with Maoist guerrillas and King Gyanendra's dismissal of the government and seizure of absolute power in 2006.

Over the years freed bonded labourers and bonded labour activists, including Anti-Slavery International's local partners Backward Society Education, Informal Sector Service Centre and the General Federation of Nepalese Trade Unions, have organised a series of large, high-profile demonstrations. These protests, held in the areas affected in the west as well as in the capital Kathmandu, have been effective in drawing attention to the fact that the Government has failed to fulfil its promises.

Last July, hundreds of activists and former bonded labourers protested in the mid and far-western districts as well as in the capital. Some 100 protesters were arrested, including Dilli Chaudhary, Director of Backward Society Education the 2002 Anti-Slavery Award winner. After a week of demonstrations held in front of the Singha Durbar, the seat of government, the authorities agreed to give freed kamaiya the vital support they were calling for: land and identity cards, which are required under the law. It also announced it would form a monitoring commission within one month, which it did. However, the commission formed last August to investigate the situation and recommend measures failed to take any action.

This July, nearly a year after the authorities' last series of promises, activists and former bonded labourers once again took to the streets in Kathmandu to demand their rights.

These latest protests led to a meeting on 22 July with Minister of Land Reform and Management Jagat Bogati and Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala. They agreed to implement the protesters' demands within a stated time frame for each of the areas where kamaiyas live.

As a result, each freed kamaiya family will be given one cubic metre of wood, 10,000 rupees (US$156) cash and five kattha (0.17 hectares) of land. Significantly, the agreement establishes a schedule of rehabilitation throughout the Western District, and requires implementation in Dang by mid-January 2008; in Banke and Kanchanpur by mid-April; and in Bardiya and Kailali districts by mid-July.

The Government also agreed to implement special programmes creating employment opportunities for former bonded labourers and education for their children. These are critical to preventing those freed from returning to bondage or other forms of slavery, including the trafficking of kamaiya children to work in such areas as factories, domestic servitude and sexual exploitation.

Success, however, depends on effective implementation; the Government of Nepal must finally live up to its promises.

It is crucial the Government creates an effective monitoring mechanism and puts the time-bound plan into action. Furthermore, former bonded labourers need to be registered and given identity cards to ensure no one is able to pose as a former bonded labourer and divert limited resources away from those who need them most. Activists have already expressed their concern over non-kamaiya pretending they have been bonded labourers in order to get land and other resources.

*Agricultural labourers from the Tharu ethnic community

summer 2007
Voice from the field

For the first time, Anti-Slavery International provided training for partners in fundraising. Fundraising Team Manager Yvonne Lane reports on her trip to Benin and on new ways of supporting the fight against slavery.

The fourth annual meeting of the Action Group Against Child Work and Trafficking/Child Domestic Workers began amid the excited chatter of old friends picking up where they left off and new contacts being made.

Over 20 participants from 11 partner organisations in 10 countries across West Africa came together in Cotonou, Benin from 7-10 May. The Action Group, the first network of West and Central African child rights organisations in the region, had visibly developed since Anti-Slavery International launched it in 2002. Then it only comprised six members from six countries. The meeting was being held to discuss its achievements so far and plans on how it would develop for the future.

Each year, tens of thousands of children as young as five years old are trafficked in West and Central Africa, many into domestic work. Because of the regional as well as domestic nature of this abuse, the Action Group comprises organisations working in countries which children are trafficked from as well as to: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Mali, Niger and Togo.

Since the Action Group was founded it has achieved notable success, both nationally and regionally. It has developed targeted action to raise awareness of child trafficking among such key sections of the population as taxi drivers, market stall holders and with policy makers, and has lobbied effectively for national legislation against this abuse. Also, nationally, it has established networks of child rights organisations in each of the participating countries to co-ordinate efforts to fight child trafficking both internally and regionally through the Action Group.

It has also developed and promoted a code of conduct for child domestic workers establishing a minimum age and defining acceptable work and conditions. The code has been translated into local languages and widely distributed among child domestic workers, their families and employers.

In 2006, Anti-Slavery International passed leadership of the Action Group to WAO Afrique in Togo. As the group enters a new phase, funding is needed to enable the development of training, awareness raising activities and planning for its continued development at the local and regional levels.

One of Anti-Slavery International's roles is to provide training and support for partners to ensure that projects continue in the long-term. To facilitate this for the Action Group, I provided fundraising training to its members. This is the first time that Anti-Slavery International has been able to offer this support, which will help strengthen each organisation's ability to identify potential funders both as individuals and for the group as a whole.

The training focused on general fundraising principles, such as identifying the aspects of their work that would be most attractive to funders, and raising funds from governments, foundations and large organisations such as Oxfam and Save the Children.

The session was particularly interesting as the concerns over fundraising highlighted by the partners were similar to those facing organisations in the UK. Most common was the difficulty in securing funds to cover the general costs of running the organisation and other ongoing expenses. Alongside this was the time involved in raising funds. As is frequently the case with small organisations in the UK, none of the Action Group's members is able to employ a dedicated fundraiser, meaning that the responsibility falls to staff working on other priority issues.

For Anti-Slavery International this was an opportunity not just to support the group, but to look at the ways in which we can develop training in fundraising for all of our partners in the long-term.