DUBAI: A recent rampage by unpaid workers at Bangladesh’s embassy in Kuwait illustrated the plight of foreign labourers in oil-rich Gulf States, where millions of them come in search of a better life but often end up in misery. The workers, mostly Asian, are frequently subjected to abuse and exploitation, making strikes a common occurrence.
Kuwait, where more than 900,000 foreigners are employed in the emirate’s private sector, is the scene of regular protests by disgruntled workers over non-payment, maltreatment or poor working conditions.
A 1,000-strong mob of Bangladeshi workers with a Kuwaiti cleaning company took out their anger at five months of unpaid wages at their embassy on April 24, causing extensive damage and slightly injuring two people. Kuwait’s labour minister has since warned employers against exploiting labourers and threatened violators with punishment.
Another 450 Asian cleaners at the emirate’s largest medical complex meanwhile went on strike for not receiving their pay for several months from a private company on contract with the health ministry.
In March, 450 workers halted work at an oil facility over 18 months of non-payment. Labourers also complain of long working hours without compensation, non-renewal of residence permits and illegal reductions in salary.
In October 2004, more than 750 complaints were filed by foreign workers at Kuwait’s ministry of social affairs and labour, according to official figures, which also show that 22.5 per cent of expat workers in the private sector receive a monthly wage of under 200 dollars.
As many as 55 per cent earn less than 400 dollars. Millions of labourers are lured to the Gulf by the prospect of high salaries, many borrowing money to pay agents ludicrous fees to get a job, including some 170,000 Bangladeshi labourers in Kuwait. Once in the region, they live frugally, remitting the bulk of their meagre earnings home to their families.
In Qatar, the legal advisor to the gas-rich state’s national human rights committee said complaints usually revolve around non-payment of wages “because the firms concerned have financial problems, or unsuitable living conditions.”
With the former, “we coordinate with the labour department and we manage to solve the problems amicably almost 90 per cent of the time,” said Mohammed Fuad.
“In the latter case, we visit the living quarters to check on conditions, and if we fail to reach an amicable settlement, we send the complainant to the labour department.” If that fails, the complainant is advised to go to court, Fuad added.
Individual complaints also pertain to ill treatment or the sponsor’s refusal to allow the worker he employs to shift to another sponsor, Fuad said.
Dubai, which is experiencing an unprecedented construction boom, partly owes its rapid transformation to tens of thousands of poorly paid, mostly Asian, workers who toil long hours in sizzling temperatures.
Reports of abuse and non-payment are widespread in the United Arab Emirates, of which Dubai is a member. One such case last year saw an Indian worker commit suicide because his company refused to lend him 13 dollars to see a doctor, after five months of not paying his wages.
The labour and social affairs ministry in Dubai, which hosts 957,000 foreigners out of a population of 1.2 million, received 3,149 complaints from employees in the first nine months of 2004.—AFP
