Dubai arrests more than 4,000 illegal workers

Preeti Kannan

$(document).ready(function() {$.get('/national/overrides/ajax/article_detail_date.jsp', {'vcmid':'f585c2fceafe4310VgnVCM100000e56411acRCRD'}, function(data) { $("#article_date").html(data);});});

DUBAI // More than 4,000 unlicensed traders, butchers, porters, car cleaners and beggars were arrested last year, most of them during Ramadan, Dubai Municipality announced yesterday.

The municipality urged residents not to employ illegal labourers, saying they posed a security threat.

"This phenomenon increases during Ramadan and festival seasons," said Obaid Ibrahim Al Marzouqi, the head of the municipality's markets section.

His department, along with Dubai Police and the Department of Residence and Foreigners Affairs, detained more than 3,000 unlicensed vendors and porters, 472 car cleaners, 188 butchers and 536 beggars.

The municipality also seized more than 57,000 pirated films, and at least 1,600 alcohol bottles.

However, some labourers said they were forced into illegal work because they had taken huge loans to pay recruitment agents in their home countries. Many said they had come to the UAE based on promises of high salaries, but after arriving were paid less than they had been told.

MR, an Indian who has been in the UAE without a residency visa for a year, said he had paid 80,000 rupees (Dh5,712) to an agent for a job in Dubai.

"I have to make up for the money I took," he said. "Our family land has been mortgaged and the only way I can get it back is by accumulating some money," said MR, who washes cars, works on building sites, and does other odd jobs.

"I was brought on a work visa by a packaging company, who promised Dh800 a month and accommodation. But they paid only Dh300 and I had to pay for my own accommodation and food. It was really difficult to make ends meet."

He quit the company after a year.

Another worker said he had been without a visa for the past five years.

"I do some electrical and plumbing jobs," said MK, also from India, who makes about Dh60 a day. He said this was the only way he could support his wife and two children.

"I would really like to go back home as I am missing my family," he said.

MK paid 60,000 rupees (Dh4,284) to an agent for a visit visa.

"I send some money home so my family can survive," he said. "There is little work in my village. At least here I can do some small jobs."

A social worker yesterday said workers should be educated on the need to secure sufficiently well-paying jobs before leaving their home countries.

"It is difficult to discourage people from coming," said Uma Rani Padmanabhan, an Indian welfare worker who helps expatriates in distress.

"If people are coming on a visit, they should report to the consulate and give details of their visit. The UAE Government should also scrutinise visit visa holders and check their academic qualifications, the purpose of their visit and other travel details," she said.

Mrs Padmanabhan said that even when workers were made aware of visa rules they often ignored them.

"They have families to support and they want to make some money fast and leave," she said.

pkannan@thenational.ae

View the original article here

Workers keep good times going

Wafa Issa

$(document).ready(function() {$.get('/national/overrides/ajax/article_detail_date.jsp', {'vcmid':'fb75d34c6c883310VgnVCM100000e56411acRCRD'}, function(data) { $("#article_date").html(data);});});

DUBAI // Many workers have chosen to extend the three-day Eid break to a full week.

Rush-hour traffic was lighter than usual yesterday, Dubai Police said, with no major crashes reported.

"The decrease could be felt on all the main roads in the morning," said Col Omar Al Shamsi, the director of the command and control room.

"I think the decrease is because some people have taken these two additional days as a holiday and many have travelled abroad."

Ebbi Chacko, an employee relations manager at Dubai Bank, said some of its workers had asked in advance to take the whole week off.

"We do not have people who have reported sick but many have taken the whole week off as they have travelled abroad during the holidays," Mr Chacko said. "About 5 per cent of our employees are off these two days."

Premjit Bangara, a general manager at Sharaf Travel, said a significant number of vacationers had chosen full-week trips.

"About 40 per cent of clients have booked holidays for the whole week," Mr Bangara said. "Families with children at schools have booked short holidays in accordance with the official holidays."

With so many people off work, some restaurants and cafes were unusually busy yesterday.

"There is still a bit of a holiday mode today," said Mai Espinosa, a server at a coffee shop. "It is busier than a normal working day but still not as busy as yesterday or the day before. The majority of the clients were residents and not tourists."

Staff at a nearby shop, however, said they noticed little difference.

"We have not had it more busy today than any other working day. It is not like the holiday or the weekend," said Carol Pano, a server.

wissa@thenational.ae

View the original article here

Workers owed billions as authorities in China fail to tackle missing wages

Daniel Bardsley (Foreign Correspondent)

BEIJING // Hei Pern's new job as a translator for an oil company seemed like just the career move he was looking for.

It offered Mr Hei, 22, an English literature graduate, originally from China's Ningxia region, a reasonable salary of $1,000 (Dh3,673) a month and the chance to travel overseas, something he had never done before.

Now, little more than three months since he started his job with such enthusiasm, the Beijing-based Mr Hei is unemployed and struggling for money, having quit after not receiving his promised pay.

In total, he earned just 3,700 yuan (Dh2,089) for almost three months' work, about one fifth of what his contract said he was due.

It is an all-too-common scenario among China's migrant workers, who can frequently go long periods without being paid.

"Anyone who worked honestly and hard [would] feel angry at these people," Mr Hei said.

"I didn't expect this would happen in the capital under the emperor's eye. I was really surprised and shocked."

What surprised Mr Hei more than not being paid was the apparent indifference of the government departments that he contacted to resolve his case.

He visited the labour bureau and district court in the Chaoyang district of Beijing.

After being told his own complaints were insufficient, he paid a lawyer 600 yuan to write a letter to the labour bureau outlining his case.

But because the oil company is registered in the province of Xinjiang, despite having offices in Beijing, officials said there was nothing they could do.

"The government departments weren't trying to help people," he said. "They drink tea and smoke cigarettes. They try their best to get away without troubling themselves."

Unpaid wages are thought to most affect China's migrant workforce, which numbers more than 200 million. In 2006, the official All China Federation of Trade Unions reported unpaid wages that year totalled 100 billion yuan, with construction workers owed more than two thirds of that amount.

The following year state media reported as much as 175bn yuan was owed to workers.

The issue has been raised at China's legislature, the National People's Congress, with delegates suggesting employers should contribute to a "security fund" that would ensure workers were paid in the event that the employer defaulted.

In Chongqing, the authorities this month took far more drastic action, deploying a SWAT team of police to raid a construction site where workers were reportedly owed up to 20,000 yuan each.

The city is run by Bo Xilai, an ambitious 61-year-old politician who is expected to become a member of China's supreme nine-strong Politburo Standing Committee next year.

Many other cases have seen workers lose their wages, or even their lives.

In October last year, state media reported that a migrant worker in Sichuan province was beaten to death by men from a personnel company after trying to claim his unpaid wages.

In the city of Shenzhen, workers have been banned from petitioning over unpaid wages in the run-up to the Universiade, or World Student Games in August, a move criticised by the state media.

Despite the issue being discussed for more than a decade, unpaid wages are still "a huge problem", said Geoffrey Crothall of China Labour Bulletin, a Hong Kong-based campaign group.

"Every year, particularly around Chinese new year, you see stories about hundreds of millions of yuan owed to migrant workers, particularly in construction," he said.

One reason, he said, is that the government does not have enough labour inspectors to visit construction sites.

In addition, many workers are employed on a casual basis and lack contracts. This makes it almost impossible for them to seek redress.

They have no proof how much they are supposed to have been paid, and how much they were actually given.

It is also an acute problem in manufacturing, with workers often going without their salary when their factories struggle with cash flow.

In some cases "workers will simply stage a protest and try to bring their plight to the attention of the local government. That's what happened in Chongqing", he said. Next page

View the original article here