Twelve Burundian women died in Arab countries between 2025 and May 2026 after travelling abroad for work, a local rights organisation said, prompting renewed calls for tighter oversight of recruitment agencies accused of trafficking and exploiting migrant workers.
ALUCHOTO, an organisation that campaigns against unemployment and torture, said in a report that 121 other women had suffered domestic or sexual violence, while 97 had been unlawfully confined in their employers’ homes.
The allegations could not be independently verified.
The group’s coordinator at the national level, Vianney Ndayisaba, accused recruitment agencies of violating international standards governing the recruitment of migrant workers, particularly by failing to ensure transparent employment contracts.
Both workers and recruitment agencies should have contracts specifying wages and job responsibilities, with copies also kept by workers’ families, Ndayisaba told local media.
“That is not the case. We have multiple examples,” he said.
Senate President Gervais Ndirakobuca has called on the government to stop approving new recruitment agencies and review the licences of existing operators.
Burundi has 65 agencies recruiting workers for overseas employment, according to figures cited by the government.
“Sixty-five agencies are too many,” Ndirakobuca said during a Senate session last week, arguing that recruitment had become a business and calling for agencies whose workers encounter problems abroad to lose their licences.
He also urged Foreign Affairs and Cooperation Minister Edouard Bizimana to ensure that employment contracts were checked before workers were sent overseas.
Bizimana acknowledged that some agencies were involved in trafficking Burundians but said certain networks operated from Kenya, from where workers were sent to destinations including Iraq and Afghanistan.
The arrangements complicate government efforts to assist workers in distress, he said, noting that Burundi has no embassy in Iraq and must rely on diplomatic support from its mission in Saudi Arabia.
The minister urged prospective migrant workers to prioritise their safety and health over wages, saying assistance becomes difficult once they encounter problems abroad.
Rights groups have repeatedly warned about the exploitation of Burundian workers in Gulf countries and elsewhere in the Middle East. In December 2025, local organisation ONLCT raised concerns about human trafficking and abuse affecting Burundians overseas.
Earlier this year, the association of recruitment agencies for migrant workers in Burundi (ORAAB) announced a 3 billion Burundian franc emergency fund to support Burundian workers abroad facing unexpected or critical situations. However, it remains unclear how many workers have received assistance from the fund so far.
More than 27,000 Burundians have been recruited through agencies to work in Arab countries since 2023, according to Burundi’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation.
