DOZENS OF UAE JOB ADS FLOUT ANTIBIAS LAWS
▶ Classified adverts online and in print reveal pattern of discrimination
Leafing through the classified ads and reading online posts, discrimination in the UAE labour market is everywhere.
From restricting jobs to 25-year-old Filipinas to asking women educated in the West to attach full-length photos with their CVs, prejudice seems to be the norm.
On Tuesday, the UAE’s labour ministry condemned adverts that unfairly exclude job seekers. Assistant Undersecretary of the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation, Dr Omar Al Nuaimi, told The National: “Prejudicial discrimination has no place in the conditions of employment, nor in wider UAE society.”
His comments came in response to reports that a UAE nursery group advertised for an English teacher of “European origin and white skin”.
Yet this advert is just one of many posted on job boards across the country, and indeed the region, which demonstrate overt discrimination that is not only wide ranging, but varied – focusing on everything from the nationality, age and even appearance of the preferred candidate.
Industry insiders and social media users in the Emirates agree that discrimination in recruitment adverts is rife.
“There are loads of job advertised that specify gender and race here,” one reader wrote on The National’s Facebook page.
A quick scan of the UAE’s job adverts reveals the scale of the problem.
In an echo of Happy Jump Nurseries’ post, Honey Bee Nursery, in Dubai, posted an advert on business and employment site LinkedIn on Tuesday calling for a “Western Female early years teacher”.
Adverts specifying gender are common.
Nakuri Gulf online recruitment platform has many that call for either male or female applicants.
One, for an “experienced nurse” in the UAE, asks for Filipino candidates below 35.
Plenty of adverts suggest positions – from sales to engineering – are suitable for men only, while another post on LinkedIn for an in-house travel and event manager includes the “skill” of being 25 to 38 years old.
Some job listings not only specify gender but include the preferred nationality of the candidate.
An advert for a financial controller on LinkedIn says being a “native English speaker, EU passport holder or western educated are highly preferred”.
Appearance is important to some recruiters too. An advert for hostesses and promoters asks that applicants send a recent full-length photograph with their application.
And it is not just smaller companies that seem to discriminate.
One listing, posted on behalf of the Nestlé consulting group, for an electrician, calls for “excellent critical thinking and problem-solving ability”, and “two years’ experience in same field”. Only men need apply, it says.
Another LinkedIn advert, posted on behalf of Microsoft Dynamics, for an AX developer, made it clear that the post is open to a “Non-Asian” only.
According to Dubai law firm Clyde & Co, “any form of discrimination, by any means of expression” is punishable by a minimum prison sentence of five years and fines of between Dh500,000 and Dh1 million.
Any company found to discriminate on the basis of race, colour, gender, nationality and social origin could be prosecuted.
On The National’s Facebook page, many readers applauded the ministry’s position that such adverts are against the law, but some worry that companies might still discriminate.
“It is good news but when it comes to the selection process, or even interviews, there will be discrimination for sure,” one reader wrote.
Another, writing on social media site Reddit, suggested the problem lay with recruiters.
“All this does is mean more CVs will just be ignored by recruiters when they check the nationality and gender,” they wrote.
“No, the problem is much deeper rooted than the recruiter’s desk,” another replied.