Moderators involved in a redundancy case against Meta, Sama and Majorel on Friday held a peaceful demo at Sama offices located in Sameer Park, along Mombasa Road to protest the company’s violation of a court order.
The demos come in the wake of claims that the company has withheld some salaries and is putting pressure on some moderators to leave the country in order to receive their dues.
Facebook content moderator James Mark Agada, who is taking part in the sit-in, said that Facebook and Sama are trying to throw “us away like garbage – but we are people.”
“The court order is clear. Sama must pay. At the moment people cannot make rent. These are some of the world’s richest companies. We are not going anywhere. We will not be intimidated. We will stay here until Facebook and Sama obey the court and pay us.”
A director of tech justice non-profit Foxglove Cori Crider, who supports the moderators, said that Facebook and Sama have shown serious contempt for the law of sovereign countries outside the US.
“These moderators are on extremely low pay and it’s shocking that these extremely wealthy companies won’t pay them. They shouldn’t have to sit in just to receive the meagre wages they are owed,” said Crider.
Executive Director of Kenyan NGO Siasa Place, Nerima Wako, who also supports the moderators in Kenya, added that Friday morning’s brave action shows you the courage of the Facebook moderators at Sama Nairobi.
“These young people deserve far better than the exploitation they have been served. These tech giants should respect our laws and pay them – NOW,” she said.
The moderators have so far obtained a court order protecting their status as legal immigrants pending the determination of the case.
In March, a court in Nairobi barred Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, from laying off its content moderation workforce pending the determination of a lawsuit that claims the planned termination is unlawful.
Meta and Sama had planned to lay off the entire content moderation workforce in Nairobi as part of the social media firm’s strategy to restructure its tech and business groups.
The interim order was reinforced by Justice Nduma Nderi temporarily saving the moderators’ jobs.
At least 184 content moderators staged a protest and a sit-in outside the company’s offices demanding their April salaries.
Sama, Facebook Outsourcer, is said to be holding onto the salaries against a court order.
The moderators in the petition say they were fired in retaliation for complaints about working conditions and attempts to form a union.
The moderators say they were blacklisted from applying for the same roles at another outsourcing firm, Luxembourg-based Majorel, after Facebook switched contractors.
Principal Judge justice Byrum Ongaya of the Employment and Labour Relations Court will hear the case including new contempt charges on May 11.
The court has already issued orders preventing the termination of employment for all Sama Moderators and stopping recruitment of new moderators by Majorel Kenya on behalf of Meta.
The labour court in February ruled that Meta could be sued after one former moderator at the Nairobi hub filed a lawsuit against it, alleging poor working conditions.
In Februray, Meta filed an appeal in Kenya challenging a ruling which said it could be sued in a separate lawsuit brought by a moderator over alleged poor working conditions, even though it has no official presence in Kenya.
The cases could have implications for how Meta works with content moderators globally.
The US giant works with thousands of moderators around the world, tasked with reviewing graphic content posted on its platform.
