diff --git a/swh/scheduler/cli.py b/swh/scheduler/cli.py
--- a/swh/scheduler/cli.py
+++ b/swh/scheduler/cli.py
@@ -17,6 +17,7 @@
 from . import compute_nb_tasks_from
 from .backend_es import SWHElasticSearchClient
 from . import get_scheduler, DEFAULT_CONFIG
+from .cli_utils import parse_options
 
 
 locale.setlocale(locale.LC_ALL, '')
@@ -300,8 +301,7 @@
 
     now = arrow.utcnow()
 
-    args = [x for x in options if '=' not in x]
-    kw = dict(x.split('=', 1) for x in options if '=' in x)
+    (args, kw) = parse_options(options)
     task = {'type': type,
             'policy': policy,
             'priority': priority,
diff --git a/swh/scheduler/cli_utils.py b/swh/scheduler/cli_utils.py
new file mode 100644
--- /dev/null
+++ b/swh/scheduler/cli_utils.py
@@ -0,0 +1,21 @@
+# Copyright (C) 2019  The Software Heritage developers
+# See the AUTHORS file at the top-level directory of this distribution
+# License: GNU General Public License version 3, or any later version
+# See top-level LICENSE file for more information
+
+
+def parse_options(options):
+    """Parses options from a CLI and turns it into Python args and kwargs.
+
+    >>> parse_options([])
+    ([], {})
+    >>> parse_options(['foo', 'bar'])
+    (['foo', 'bar'], {})
+    >>> parse_options(['foo=bar'])
+    ([], {'foo': 'bar'})
+    >>> parse_options(['foo', 'bar=baz'])
+    (['foo'], {'bar': 'baz'})
+    """
+    args = [x for x in options if '=' not in x]
+    kw = dict(x.split('=', 1) for x in options if '=' in x)
+    return (args, kw)