Russian companies are widening their campaign to find young African women to help fill a labor shortage, heightening concern many are being deployed in the Ukraine war effort.
The latest drive is in South Africa, a fellow member of the BRICS block of large emerging market economies. One of the main recruiters, Alabuga Special Economic Zone in Tatarstan, produces military drones. South Africa’s government is now investigating what Russian companies are doing and what their intentions are, a person familiar with the situation said.
The push involves organizations using BRICS branding. The local chapter of the BRICS Women’s Business Alliance signed an agreement in May to supply Alabuga and house builder Etalonstroi Ural with a combined 5,600 workers next year.
That came after the South Africa-based BRICS Student Commission posted adverts for construction and hospitality jobs at Alabuga in January available to women between the ages of 18 and 22, and Instagram and TikTok influencers from South Africa began advertising them.
“Russia is sitting with a demand for workforce,” Lebogang Zulu, who chairs the women’s alliance and inked the deal on a trip to Russia earlier this year, told Bloomberg. “South Africa is sitting with a crisis of unemployment.”
Russia’s aging and shrinking population, coupled with the loss of hundreds of thousands of men to the front line in Ukraine and a spike in salaries, has left a hole in the labor market. At the same time, a third of the workforce in South Africa is unemployed. But while the economics might make sense, the recruitment push is drawing increasing scrutiny.
The Alabuga zone, for example, has been accused in three research reports from organizations including the Institute for Science and International Security, or ISIS, of tricking African women into working at the plant assembling Shahed 136 kamikaze drones. Women are viewed as more reliable than men for the specific kind of work, according to ISIS.
Officials in Pretoria may summon Russia’s diplomatic representatives to answer questions, the person familiar with the situation said. They asked not to be identified because a public statement hasn’t been made.
“The South African government is actively investigating reports of foreign programs that recruit South Africans under false pretenses,” the Department of International Relations and Cooperation said in response to questions. “The South African government is yet to find any credible evidence that job offers in Russia are inconsistent with their stated purpose. However, the government has noted the alleged recruitment of youth by the Alabuga company.”
Questions sent to Alabuga Start, the zone’s recruitment arm, and Etalonstroi Ural went unanswered. At an event in Botswana, an Alabuga representative denied that African workers were employed in drone plants. The Student Commission and the BRICS Women’s Business Alliance also denied that workers recruited with their help would end up working at the facility.
“There is not much concrete evidence of people going there suffering,” Thembehlile Mpungose, secretary general of the commission, said in an interview. “We are poor and we need opportunities. We are not sending people there to build drones.”
Indeed, the prospect of working in Russia is an attractive one for many in a country where more than 48% of women below the age of 34 are jobless. Alabuga’s advertising says monthly pay can be up to $800, no more than a decent salary in South Africa but at least a job — and significantly less than the average in the Tatarstan region.
In April, representatives of the student commission and Alabuga Start visited the Beyers Naude Secondary School in Soweto, Johannesburg, twice to advertise the work program, according to students.
On a visit to the school, some of them told Bloomberg they were given Alabuga-branded T-shirts and pens, promised jobs and free flights and told they could work their way up into getting their own apartment through employment at the zone. They were asked to sign up to a recruitment tool on WhatsApp, they said.
In literature on Alabuga Start’s website, there’s no mention of work in the drone factory. But reports by ISIS and the Global Initiative Against Transnational Crime said most women who signed up were put to work in the drone plant despite not being told about it beforehand.
The Associated Press also reported in 2024 that African women were working in the plant against their will. The drone plant and the Alabuga economic zone have been repeatedly bombed by Ukraine including as recently as Aug. 9.
“We’ve estimated that roughly 90% of the women who go to Alabuga end up in the drone program,” said Spencer Faragasso, a senior research fellow at Washington-based ISIS. “They’re building weapons and they’re being exposed to the line of fire because they’re a part of a war now.”
Alabuga is currently building residential units that could hold an additional 41,000 workers, an indication that it plans to expand drone production, ISIS said in a July 28 report.
The BRICS Women’s Business Alliance isn’t involved in sending people to unsafe work environments, according to Chris Maphanga, a board member. The group is trying to help Russia meet a shortage of 4.8 million workers and is also in talks with other companies including shoemaker Orthomoda, he said.
The alliance said it operates “under the mandate” of South Africa’s Women’s Ministry. Zulu, who says she is a South African princess, was accompanied on her Russia trip by unidentified South African parliamentarians, the alliance said on its website.
The Women’s Ministry said in a statement that it’s not formally linked to the BRICS Women’s Business Alliance, although it’s aware of the organization. It has no knowledge of the Russian recruitment program. The foreign, education and labor ministries didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Until now, Alabuga primarily targeted poorer African countries like Burkina Faso and Ethiopia. It hired just 22 workers through the program in its first year of operation in 2023, though has set a 2025 target of more than 8,000, it said on its website. In the first half of 2024, it said of its 182 recruits just six were South African.
Russian companies and institutions have also been active in seeking recruits elsewhere in southern Africa.
In April, Alabuga Start held an event at the University of Botswana in the country’s capital, Gaborone. At that event representatives denied that applicants would work in drone plants when questioned by parents of prospective candidates. They also depicted the program as a way of empowering young women as an explanation for why men are excluded.
In Lesotho, an enclave within South Africa, Mahali Phamotse, an opposition party leader and former education minister, has been recruiting young people for study and work opportunities in Russia.
The drive prompted the government to issue a statement warning parents to be careful where they sent their students. Phamotse declined to say which Russian institutions she was working with when contacted by Bloomberg. Some of those recruited left for Russia on Aug. 20, Meloli Airwaves, a local media organization, reported.
“A lot of these women live in locations where they’re vulnerable, they have few opportunities for education, to work, to live an independent life, to travel,” Faragasso at ISIS said. “When they get to Alabuga they have a rude awakening in terms of what they were promised and what the work is that they’re actually doing.”
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