When will Africa become a land of the free, devoid of the master-maid syndrome? It is becoming more pathetic that house maids have continued to visit anger against their so-called masters on the innocent kids they are hired to look after. It is the responsibility of the parents to protect their little children.
It may be true that work and other engagements especially in the cities may make it almost impossible not to have someone to help with the kids but ‘masters’, when they must do so must make sure it’s someone they can trust with the lives of their children. Last month, we all watched in horror as a Ugandan maid battered a 2 year old girl.
This week we heard about the maid who took two young boys from their home in Lagos after just a few weeks of working with the family. And there is a story making the rounds about a maid in Abuja who strangled a 3 year old girl to death recently just because the girl’s mum told her she couldn’t travel to her village for Christmas.
The disappointed maid was said to have killed the little girl in anger because the girl’s mother had insisted she had to stay in Abuja to look after the child.
Many of the ‘masters’ must have been treating their maids like the slaves of the 19th century, treating them as if they are not human beings. When they show so much disparity in treatment between their own child and their maid, they must realize that it may have its consequences especially when they are not around to supervise the maid.
This is the 21st century and so, Africans should be moving away from the master-maid mentality and tradition; after all, they usually cope with their situations when they live in the western world where servitude in maids are non existent.