In a sobering warning delivered during a radio interview on Tuesday, Kenya’s Principal Secretary for Diaspora Affairs, Roseline Njogu, said a growing number of Kenyans seeking work abroad may be inadvertently complicit in their own exploitation.
Speaking on Spice FM, Ms Njogu urged jobseekers to work closely with government-approved channels when pursuing overseas employment, cautioning that many have fallen prey to increasingly sophisticated human trafficking networks masquerading as recruiters.
“These are not just unfortunate incidents. In some cases, Kenyans are actively bypassing safeguards put in place for their own protection,” she said.
According to the Principal Secretary, traffickers—often posing as travel agents—are using falsified documents and deceptive promises to lure individuals into high-risk destinations, including Thailand, Myanmar, and Lebanon. Some migrants, she added, provide misleading information at departure points, claiming to be travelling to neighbouring countries such as Ethiopia, only to end up in regions blacklisted due to rights violations and unsafe working conditions.
“Despite a two-year ban on labour migration to Lebanon, we are still seeing cases of Kenyans ending up there. It’s deeply worrying,” she said.
Ms Njogu expressed frustration that many young people choose to ignore formal government-organised job placement programmes such as the Kazi Majuu initiative—designed to connect Kenyans with vetted overseas employers—in favour of unverified offers found on social media.
“Young people will not attend government job fairs, but they’ll take a job from a faceless person on Facebook or WhatsApp. It defies logic, but that’s the reality,” she said.
Her comments come amid mounting concerns over the surge in job scams that have left many Kenyans stranded or trapped in exploitative conditions abroad. The government, she said, is ramping up efforts to track illegal recruiters and crack down on agencies operating outside the legal framework.
At the heart of the issue is a complex web of desperation, misinformation, and the allure of opportunity abroad. But Njogu’s message was clear: while poverty and unemployment push many to seek work outside Kenya’s borders, the cost of taking shortcuts is often dangerously high.
“We’re not just talking about lost money. We’re talking about lost lives, lost dignity, and families left in pain,” she said.
