Meta was temporarily barred from working with new content moderation subcontractor Majorel by a Kenyan court. This is pending hearing of a new lawsuit filed yesterday by 43 content moderators over illegal dismissal and blacklisting.
The interim injunction prohibits Meta’s content moderation partner, Sama, from influencing any form of termination. The hearing is scheduled for March 28th, during which Sama will exclusively provide content review services to Meta.
That’s because Sama plans to lay off the 260 content moderators serving Eastern and Southern Africa at the end of this month after shutting down its content review department in January.
Moderators allege “wrongful termination” by Sama and discrimination by Majorel, who claims to have blacklisted all former Sama employees. The petition claims that moderators applying for jobs at Majorel were “rejected on the basis that they had previously worked at the third defendant’s (Sama) facility.”
The moderators allege in a petition before the Employment and Labor Relations Court that Sama failed to issue termination notice as required by Kenyan law. was never issued, and the final dues were based on signing confidential documents.
Sama says it complies with Kenyan law and has communicated its decision to stop moderating content at city hall and through emails and notices.
Sama’s troubles began after former employees, along with Meta, sued Sama for union-busting allegations that opened up the working conditions that moderators experience to mitigate the harmfulness of social sites like Facebook. .
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