Appraisal of the Legal Framework Governing Child Domestic Workers and Kinship Fosterage in Nigeria

One of the most underregulated categories of child labour in Nigeria is child domestic work under kinship fosterage arrangements. It occupies a grey area between customary childcare and forced servitude. This study assessed the legal framework surrounding child domestic workers and kinship fosterage in Nigeria to examine to what extent existing laws protect children involved in domestic labour in their foster homes. The study adopted a doctrinal research approach, analysing primary sources such as the Constitution, Labour Act, Child’s Rights Act 2003, Trafficking in Persons (Prohibition) Enforcement and Administration Act 2015, and Evidence (Amendment) Act 2023, together with secondary sources like international and regional instruments including the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989, African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child 1990, and selected International Labour Organisation Conventions. The study revealed that while Nigeria’s laws effectively criminalise child trafficking and hazardous child labour, they continue to create an exception known as the "family-work exemption" in the Labour Act and the Child Rights Act that allows children to engage in domestic chores under the same conditions as if they were adults and in domestic settings outside of the age restrictions and work limits set for regular employment. These factors, along with partial domestication of the Child’s Rights Act across states, lack of ratification of ILO Convention 189 by Nigeria and the incapacity of the relevant agencies such as NAPTIP to monitor informal household-based child placement, led to exploitation of children through family arrangements largely remaining invisible to regulatory bodies. The study suggested that to prevent exploitation in fosterage through kinship relationships, there is no need to introduce new legislation; instead, close existing exemptions in current laws, domesticate Convention 189, and develop monitoring systems.