A TV review by Mark Langabeer (Hastings and Rye Labour member) – see the BBC1 programme here.
Tom Odula, a reporter in Kenya has been investigating allegations that managers at tea plantations in the Rift Valley take on female workers if they comply with demands for sex. Of the hundred women he spoke to, seventy-five said that they had been sexually harassed.
He interviewed women employed at Unilever, an Anglo-Dutch-owned tea company, responsible for big brands such as PG Tips, Liptons and Sainsbury Red. Around half of tea that we consume is grown in the Rift Valley.
The company claim that they have a zero-tolerance policy. The evidence suggest otherwise. An undercover reporter sought employment and was asked for sexual favours in return for work, which she refused to do, of course. The reporter did get a job, because her application form had already been processed. However, she was given the task of weeding, the hardest work on the plantation. When she requested lighter work, the supervisor would only grant this if she agreed to sex.
Sexual favours “only option”
According to Panorama, the problem of sexual harassment emerged over ten years ago. The managers wield enormous power because one in three adults in Kenya are unemployed. They earn £25 a week, working six days a week and ten hours each day. They have families to feed and granting sexual favours is their only option.
The company did put in place new procedures. Women were able to report incidents to a member of staff who dealt with sexually-related incidents. The undercover reporter stated that the advice was to protect herself and that they would get back to her. They never did – and that seems to be the experience of most of the women that actually made a complaint.
A Scottish based company called Finleys also owns a plantation in the Valley. It supplies tea to Tesco and other supermarkets. Their revenues are around £52 million annually. The documentary discovered that over 2,000 former staff at Finleys are taking legal action over workplace injuries which caused their employment to be terminated.
Abuse
The undercover reporter discovered that the manager of this farm was also a sexual predator. Panorama contacted the top brass of these companies. They usually state that they are appalled by these allegations. In most cases, they do little to prevent the abuse of women.
The Panorama programme gives a glimpse of imperialism, including the British variety, which is essentially the super-exploitation of the peoples of so-called developing nations by huge capitalist companies. Although the British Empire has mostly come to an end, this injustice continues, in spite of political leaders in the west (including the Labour leader) now mouthing hypocritical phrases about the evils of imperialism.
