Facebook faces suit over work conditions in Nairobi office
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Loading... - Gatimu Ogola
- 30 Mar 2022
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A former Facebook employee who was reportedly fired after questioning working conditions has threatened to sue the parent company Meta for wrongful termination of his contract.
Mr Daniel Motaung, a former content moderator for the social media platform, claims he was fired for trying to organise a trade union with his 100 co-workers in the Nairobi office to protest what they felt were exploitative working conditions.
His lawyers on Tuesday wrote a demand letter to Meta and a San Francisco-based Ethical Artificial Intelligence (AI) firm called Sama, which provides content moderation services for Facebook in Nairobi.
The letter put the two firms on notice of a forthcoming legal suit for violating the rights of Kenyan and international staff, noting that it was their constitutional right to form a union.
Global operations
“Content moderators like Daniel are the most important and least-discussed aspect of Facebook’s global operations. Their job is to sift through the social media posts of Facebook’s nearly three billion monthly users and remove posts that violate its rules – such as graphic violence, hate, and misinformation,” it stated.
They said the nature of the work poses a health risk of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which has not been addressed.
“Facebook subcontracts most of this work to companies like Sama – a practice that keeps Facebook’s profit margins high but at the cost of thousands of moderators’ health – and the safety of Facebook worldwide. Sama moderators report ongoing violations, including conditions which are unsafe, degrading, and pose a risk of PTSD,” the letter said. Read More…
