Background checks are necessary before domestic workers are hired
From a former Vice-Chancellor of Federal University of Technology, Akure to the Chairman of Credit Switch Technology to a Lebanese businessman to a naval officer and his girlfriend, the list of murder by domestic servants in Nigeria is long. And with the upsurge in the cases of how cooks, maids, drivers, guards and other personal staff who work in the house, directly attack or collude with criminals to kidnap or kill their employers, there are general concerns about persons Nigerians bring home to work for them. Security experts have warned that in employing those to perform household chores, proper background checks should be conducted not only on them, but also on those who provide them with references.
In one particular case, three security guards who are still at large attacked their Indian boss before carting away most of his possessions. In another, an apprentice petroleum tanker driver killed his master and diverted a truck-load of aviation fuel destined for Port Harcourt to Taraba State. According to the Lagos Police Command Criminal Investigation Department, the murdered man had hired the suspect to accompany him on the Port Harcourt trip. But when, three days after he left Lagos with over N5.5 million worth of aviation fuel, the cargo still hadn’t arrived Port Harcourt, a search party was put in motion. It was the company’s tracking device that helped investigators realise that the truck was nowhere near Port Harcourt, but in Mutum Biyu, Taraba State. That was how the culprit was arrested and he confessed to killing his benefactor out of greed.
From Lagos to Benin, Enugu to Birnin-Kebbi, stories of domestic workers harming their employers or members of their household is becoming an everyday story. But in all the cases, there is an element of carelessness. It would seem that in hiring domestic workers, employers place little emphasis on running background checks on them. And in several instances, this has proven to be a serious mistake with dire consequences. Indeed, had those who have fallen prey to criminals disguised as domestic workers been more careful in recruiting them, they probably would have spared their families the agony of their untimely death.
What has come out of most of the investigations is that many people employ men or women they hardly know. This is a dangerous risk to take. “There are many cases of people who employ home helps simply because someone referred the home helps to them. They do not carry out any background checks to know where the domestic worker hails from, their family, home address, temperament, etc. This is a huge mistake”, said a security expert, Mr Kunle Oladipupo. “You cannot just employ someone for a job in the corporate world without knowing them to some extent. However, the opposite is sometimes the case when some people are employing home helps.”
We hope people will listen to that admonition. Conventional wisdom teaches that people should not just take in strangers into their homes. There are too many criminals on the prowl hence the need to take precautions. A retired Assistant Inspector-General of Police, Isaac Eke, once highlighted the danger inherent in employing as domestic servants people whose backgrounds cannot be easily verified. “I want to appeal to people to always carry out background checks before employing domestic workers,” he said at the time. It is an admonition that should be heeded by those who want to live in peace with their families. It is one that could also make a difference between life and death.
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