Brands drop Kuwaiti blogger after rant on Filipino maids

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What you say on the Internet may be used against you – and for Kuwaiti beauty blogger Sondos Alqattan, the backlash has been swift. Three major cosmetics brands cut ties with Alqattan after she posted a video questioning Kuwait’s new labor laws which give maids the right to keep their passports and one day off a week.

Max Factor Arabia, French brand M. Micallef and London-based Chelsea Beatique have all terminated contracts with the beauty blogger, according to Gulf News. Alqattan has over 2.3 million Instagram followers and posts beauty tutorials.

"How can you have a servant at home who keeps their own passport with them? What's worse is they have one day off every week," she said in a video on July 10. The video has since been deleted.

Social media comments accused her of being racist and supporting “modern-day slavery.”

Kuwait is home to about 260,000 Philippine citizens who work and live in the country, mostly as domestic servants.

Alqattan’s video was in response to a new agreement signed between Kuwait and the Philippines in May. The agreement guarantees workers food, housing, clothing and health insurance. It also prevents employers from taking their passports and mobile phones.

In a follow-up statement posted to Instagram on Tuesday, Alqattan defends the practice of keeping passports, writing “the passport of any expat employee should be in the possession of the employer to protect the employee’s interest.” She goes on, “I have not mistreated, degraded or in any way mistreated an employee of mine. And for that, I consider all employees as human being with equal rights to that is mine.”

The statement did not include an apology.

Alqattan’s comments came after months of tension between Kuwait and the Philippines after the body of 29-year-old Filipino maid Joanna Daniela Demafelis was found in a freezer. Her body showed signs of torture and led Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte to issue a partial ban on workers going to Kuwait.

(Top photo: Screenshot of Sondos Alqattan's public Instagram page)