- Dan Ron
- BBC Sports Editor
Amnesty International said that security guards working on projects for the World Cup soccer tournament, which Qatar will host next November, are subject to conditions “amounting to forced labour”.
In a new report published by Amnesty International, days following the World Cup lottery was officially drawn, the human rights organization documented the experiences of 34 employees from eight private security companies.
Migrant workers told Amnesty International of months or even years of working without a single day off. Most of them said that their employers refused to allow them a day off per week despite Qatari law. Workers who took their day off faced arbitrary deductions from their salaries.
Amnesty International said that the workers were employees of private companies that provide services to sites including football stadiums, as well as infrastructure projects necessary to organize the World Cup.
At least three companies have provided security services for FIFA competitions in Qatar, including the 2020 FIFA Club World Cup and the 2021 FIFA Arab Cup.
According to Amnesty International, FIFA and the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy in Qatar did not renew the contracts of two of these companies, without providing a full report on the reasons for not renewing, and whether this was done transparently and impartially.
The rights organization said that neither FIFA nor the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy had worked to detect violations, or attempt to remedy them.
For its part, the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy said: “Unfortunately, three companies did not comply with labor laws in a number of regions in the 2020 Club World Cup and the 2021 Arab Cup.”
The committee added in a statement: “These violations are totally unacceptable, and were followed by a package of measures, which included placing contractors on a watch list or on a black list to avoid contracting with them on future projects – including projects related to the World Cup – before referring the matter to the Ministry of Labor”.
Amnesty International quoted one of the hotel security workers, a Kenyan, as saying that he had been working for months without getting a single day off. Another security worker, a Bengali, said he had not had a day off in three years.
Qatari law stipulates that working hours per week shall not exceed 60 hours, including overtime, with workers given a full day off with pay every week.
But Amnesty International said that 29 of the 34 guard workers who spoke to it said they worked 12 hours a day, while 28 said they were not routinely allowed to have a day off, meaning many were working 84 hours a week, and that this The situation has continued for weeks.
“systematic violations“
Hassan Al Thawadi, Secretary General of the Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy in Qatar
Between April 2021 and February 2022, Amnesty International interviewed a number of current and former security guards. Amnesty International considered that the similarity of statements made by employees in a number of companies “indicates systematic violations.”
“Despite the progress Qatar has made in recent years, we have found through research that there are still systemic and structural abuses in the private security sector that will be in high demand during the World Cup,” said Stephen Cockburn, Head of Economic and Social Justice at Amnesty International. .
Cockburn believed that with the approach of the World Cup, FIFA should focus on doing more to prevent violations in the private security sector, in order to avoid offending the image of the World Cup.
Cockburn called on FIFA to “use its influence to pressure Qatar to further implement reforms and laws,” saying that “time is running out quickly.”
In response, Qatar’s Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy said that since 2014 it has been committed to protecting the health, security and safety of all those working on projects related to the organization of the World Cup.
“We are committed to addressing and redressing any breach of our standards through our own enforcement mechanisms,” the committee added.
The committee noted that its inspections of workers’ welfare resulted in the referral of 391 contractors to the Ministry of Labor, and that 50 of them were prohibited from dealing with them in future projects. The committee also indicated that a number of workers received financial compensation.
For its part, the International Football Association confirmed that it does not accept any violation of workers by companies working in preparation for the World Cup.
In a statement, FIFA said: “Following investigations that took place during the Club World Cup and the Arab Cup, contractors who failed to meet the required standards were identified, and the problem was immediately addressed.”
FIFA also announced that more than 150 hotels in Qatar are required to meet the Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy’s Workers’ Welfare Standards, as well as in relation to pre-contract audits of companies that will provide services for the World Cup – including security companies.
In 2017, Qatar embarked on what Amnesty International described as an “encouraging agenda” to address employment-related problems – and has since undertaken legal reforms that have included a new minimum wage, as well as an overhaul of the sponsorship system.
However, Amnesty International considers that these reforms “have not been implemented effectively”.
In a statement, the Qatari Ministry of Labor said that Amnesty International’s report “highlights a select few cases, and ignores the positive impact of reforms taking place in Qatar as a whole.”
The Secretary-General of the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy, Hassan Al-Thawadi, confirmed to the BBC last week that “real progress” had been made in the field of workers’ welfare, and that human rights criticism of Qatar lacked a close look at the situation.
