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that Sama managers regularly rejected
counselors’ requests to let content mod-
erators take “wellness breaks” during
the day because of the impact it would
have on productivity.
Workers say Sama has also sup-
pressed their efforts to secure better
working conditions. In the summer of
2019, content moderators threatened
to strike within seven days unless they
were given better pay and conditions.
Sama responded by flying two execu-
tives from San Francisco to Nairobi to
deal with the uprising. Within weeks,
Daniel Motaung, the attempted strike’s
leader, who was in the process of for-
mally filing trade-union papers, had
been fired—accused by Sama of taking
action that would put its relationship
with Facebook at “great risk.” Sama told
other participants in the labor action ef-
fort that they were expendable and that
they should either resign or get back to
work, several workers told TIME. The
employees stood down before the seven
days were up and got no pay increase.
“At Sama, it feels like speaking the
truth or standing up for your rights is a
crime,” a second employee says. “They
made sure by firing some people that
this will not happen again. I feel like it’s
modern slavery, like neocolonialism.”
Sama disputes this characterization
and said in a statement that its content
moderators are paid triple the Kenyan
minimum wage.
Foxglove, a legal NGO based in Lon-
don, says it has informed Sama it is pre-
paring legal action in relation to its al-
leged wrongful termination of Motaung.
“Firing workers for trying to organize is
against the law,” says Cori Crider, Fox-
glove’s director. “Daniel did a brave
thing by blowing the whistle here—as
was his legal right.” The Katiba Insti-
tute, a Kenyan public- interest law firm,
is assisting with the case.
Sama denies that there was any strike
or labor action. “We value our employ-
ees and are proud of the long-standing
work we have done to create an ethi-
cal AI supply chain,” Shriram Natara-
jan, the head of Sama’s Nairobi office,
said in an emailed statement. “We exist
to provide ethical AI to our global cus-
tomers, and we are proud of the role
our employees play in building new
online experiences and cleaning up the
internet. It’s a tough job, and it’s why
we invest heavily in training, personal
development, wellness programs, and
competitive salaries.”
Facebook says it spent more than
$5 billion on safety measures in 2021.
It contracts the services of more than
15,000 content moderators globally,
most of whom are employed by third
parties like Sama. In response to a de-
tailed set of questions for this story, a
spokesperson for Facebook’s parent
company Meta said, “We take our re-
sponsibility to the people who review
content for Meta seriously and re-
quire our partners to provide industry-
leading pay, benefits, and support.”
Motaung was a 27-year-old univer-
sity graduate from South Africa looking
for his first job when he saw an ad from
Sama seeking Zulu speakers.
△
Sama says it hires many workers
from Nairobi’s slums. Mukuru kwa
Njenga is less than two miles away
KHADIJA FARAH FOR TIME (2)
