KATHMANDU: A recent report by an international human rights watchdog has stated that migrant workers in Qatar are facing up stark exploitation in contrast to the repeated assurance made by Qatar’s government to address their woes.
Migrant workers even in the capital city Doha are not paid timely wages and the Qatar government has not paid heed to their plights in spite of Qatar’s constant promises to improve workers’ rights ahead of the 2022 World Cup, according to a report by Amnesty International.
Migrant workers from 16 countries including Nepal, India, the Philippines, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka among others are working in the country to construct infrastructures for the global sporting extravaganza. Some three million foreign workers are currently engaged in Qatar.
The human rights watchdog stated that since March 2,000 workers have moved Qatar’s new Committees for the Settlement of Labor Disputes after three major companies alone have left hundreds of employees penniless.
Amnesty’s 52-page report – All work, no pay: The struggle of Qatar’s migrant workers for justice – shows how several hundred migrant workers employed by three construction and cleaning companies were forced to return home penniless.
While Qatari law states that the committees are supposed to issue judgments on cases within six weeks of a complaint, Amnesty found that workers had to wait between three and eight months. In the meantime, they lived without income in labor camps lacking sufficient food or running water, facing an impossible choice over whether to go home or fight on, according to the report.
While the woes of the migrant works have remained unheard by their companies, the Qatari government has also kept a mum over the issue despite different international organizations and media unearthing severe financial and labor exploitations foreign workers have been facing, the report states.
In 2018, the government had vowed to listen and address the grievances of foreign workers but it has not been enforced, the report pointed out, adding that concerned officials have been always making an excuse.
The Qatari government, on the other hand, has announced that it has been working with International Labor Organization (ILO) and other organizations for making a change and it was ready to act immediately on grievances of foreign workers. Amnesty International said it was rather a publicity stunt before the international community.
Earlier, a German television report had painted a grim picture of Nepali migrant workers in Qatar with over 1,400 Nepali migrant workers breathing their last while constructing stadiums in a period nine years.
Mute labor-exporting countries
Different reports by International Trade Union Federation have stated that foreign workers in Qatar are being exploited as the labor-exporting countries are silent on the issue.
The Federation has been stating that workers are still reeling under exploitation as foreign diplomatic missions in Qatar have failed to work effectively in supports of migrants workers.
Diplomatic missions in Qatar have always failed to grill the employers over the exploitation of workers, the report by Amnesty International has stated. Thus, workers have failed to get justice, the report adds.
Over 500,000 Nepali migrant workers are currently working in Qatar. Record maintained by the Department of Foreign Employment states some 7,000 youths leave Nepal for Qatar on a monthly basis for jobs.
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