After the first time she hurt me it came to my mind that I
want to go back to the Philippines. But then I thought if I go back to the
Philippines, what will happen to my family? I cannot support them if I’m
back there. But it was too late. Every day madam beat me.
–Maria C.,
migrant domestic worker, Manama, January 2010.
I received only one [full] salary, and for the other months
I got BD27 [$72], but signed for the full amount. The foreman said,
“You’ll get the rest in two days, it’s not a problem, so just
sign it.” When he said that, I signed it.
After working for five months, I asked for my money but
they didn’t give me my money. [The site engineer] told me, “Do your
work; I’m not going to give you money. We’re only going to give you
money for food, BD15 [$40] for 30 days.”
I told him, don’t give me money for food, send me
home—I paid 80,000 rupees [$1705] on my house and I have to give it back.
He said, “There is no money, go to the Labor Ministry, go to the embassy,
you won’t get your money.”
–Sabir
Illhai, migrant construction worker, Manama, February 2010.
For over three decades, millions of workers—mostly
from south and southeast Asian countries such as India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka,
and the Philippines—have flocked to the Persian Gulf in the hope of
earning better wages and improving the lives of their families back home.
Most of these workers come from impoverished,
poorly-educated backgrounds and work as construction laborers, domestic
workers, masons, waitresses, care givers, and drivers. Providing construction
and service industries with much-needed cheap labor, they have helped fuel
steady economic growth in countries such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab
Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, Qatar, and Bahrain.
Despite their indispensable contribution to the life of
their Gulf hosts, many workers have experienced human rights and labor rights
abuses, including unpaid and low wages, passport confiscation, restrictions on
their mobility, substandard housing, food deprivation, excessive and forced
work, as well as physical, psychological, and sexual abuse.
The small island nation of Bahrain, with approximately 1.3
million residents, has earned a reputation among labor-receiving countries in
the Gulf as the most committed to improving migrant labor practices. Its
efforts include new safety regulations, measures to combat human trafficking,
workers’ rights education campaigns, and reforms aimed at allowing
migrants to freely leave their jobs. However, questions remain about the
implementation and adequacy of these reforms.
This report explores the experience of Bahrain’s more
than 458,000 migrant workers who make up around 77 percent of the
country’s workforce—most working in unskilled or low-skilled jobs,
in industries such as construction, retail and wholesale and domestic work. The
report traces the many forms of abuse and exploitation to which migrant workers
in Bahrain are subjected by employers and the obstacles and failures that
prevent them from seeking effective redress for such treatment. It outlines the
rights and international legal standards that apply to workers, and calls on
the governments of Bahrain and of labor-sending countries to adopt additional
protections for migrant workers in Bahrain.
Employer and Recruitment Abuses against Migrant
Workers
The plight of many migrant workers in Bahrain begins in
their home countries, where poverty and financial obligations entice them to
seek higher paying jobs abroad. Often, they pay local recruitment agencies fees
equivalent to approximately 10 to 20 months wages in Bahrain, even though
Bahraini law forbids anyone from charging such fees to workers. It is common
for construction and other low-skilled male workers to pay such fees, although
uncommon for domestic workers, who tend to come to Bahrain through formal
recruitment agencies. The debt that many workers incur to pay recruitment
agencies and airfare means they feel compelled to stay in jobs despite unpaid
wages or unsafe housing and worksite conditions for months and even years.
Once in Bahrain, migrants depend on regular payment of their
salaries to meet their own immediate financial needs and those of their
families at home, or to meet monthly loan repayments. Workers indicated that
the problem of unpaid wages tops the list of their grievances. Although
nonpayment of wages is a criminal as well as civil offence in Bahrain, some
employers withhold wages from migrant workers for many months. Without an
income source, migrant workers take on more debt to cover basic needs. In 2008
and 2009 the Individual Complaints Department at the Ministry of Labor received
nearly 1,800 complaints of withheld and late wages. Out of 62 migrant workers
whom Human Rights Watch interviewed, 32 reported that their employers withheld
their wages for between three to ten months: one domestic worker did not
receive wages from her employer for five years. The government did not reply to
Human Rights Watch’s 2012 request for 2010 and 2011 numbers.
On average, migrant workers in Bahrain earn BD205 or $544 a
month, compared to BD698 ($1,853) earned by Bahrainis, and comprise 98 percent
of “low pay” workers (the government defines “low pay”
as less than BD200, or $530, monthly). Most migrant workers interviewed by
Human Rights Watch earned between BD40 and 100 ($106-$265) monthly, while a few
earned up to BD120 ($318) with overtime. The Indian government requires a
monthly salary of at least BD100 ($265) for its nationals in Bahrain, while the
Philippines requires at least BD150 ($398). Employers rarely meet these rates.
The Bahraini government has resisted adopting minimum wage legislation.
Domestic workers earn notably less than migrants in other
sectors, as little as BD35 ($92) per month, averaging BD70 ($186), according to
the government. Many work up to 19-hour days, with minimal breaks and no days
off. Many domestics reported that they were prevented from leaving their
employer’s homes, and some said they received little food. Workers in
other sectors such as construction and service industries generally work 8-hour
days and receive Fridays off, although about a dozen construction workers
reported regularly working 11 to 13-hour days without overtime pay.
Employers typically house construction workers and other
male laborers in dormitory-style accommodation in labor camps that can be
cramped and dilapidated with insufficient sanitation, running water, or other
basic amenities. Three of the four camps that Human Rights Watch visited had
kitchens with kerosene burners, which are fire hazards and violate Bahraini
code. While Bahrain’s Ministry of Labor has worked to improve camps and
make them safer, it has too few inspectors and substandard camps continue to
operate.
Some migrant workers experience physical abuse in the form
of beatings as well as psychological and verbal abuse. There are no reliable
numbers on cases of physical abuse, but 11 of the 62 workers Human Rights Watch
interviewed reported abuse. Over half of these were domestic workers, some of
whom were also subject to sexual abuse and harassment by employers and
recruitment agents, such as unwanted advances, groping, fondling, and rape.
Human Rights Watch interviewed four domestic workers who reported sexual
harassment, assault, or rape by their recruitment agents, employers, or employers’
sons.
Exploited or abused migrant workers often want to change
jobs or return home. Employers almost universally continue to confiscate
migrant employees’ passports upon arrival, even though the practice is
prohibited. Bahraini authorities largely fail to enforce prohibitions on
confiscating passports or compel employers to return the documents. The
Ministry of Labor, immigration officials, and police all say they formally and
informally ask employers to return passports, but they lack the authority to
compel employers who refuse to do so. Workers can appeal to courts, but it can
be difficult to enforce court orders to return passports when employers refuse
to comply. Furthermore, employers must cancel work visas before migrant workers
can leave the country. Senior immigration officials can waive this requirement,
but only do so after repeatedly trying to persuade the employer to cooperate—a
process that can take weeks or even months. Employers also frequently try to
extract payments from employees in exchange for returning their passports and
signing a visa release.
Attacks against Migrant Workers
Migrant workers in Bahrain not only experience abuses within
the context of the employee-employer relationship but also face discrimination
and other abuses from Bahraini society in general. Since 2008, Human Rights
Watch has received reports of assaults on South Asian migrant workers by Arab
men who were not the workers’ employers. For a very brief time in
mid-March 2011, as the confrontation between security forces and anti-government
protesters intensified, these attacks escalated dramatically. The attacks took
place amid growing frustration by many Shia Bahrainis who believe migrant
workers are taking jobs, especially positions with the police and security
forces, away from citizens. Pakistanis, some of whom have been naturalized,
comprise a significant percentage of Bahrain’s riot police.
Human Rights Watch documented several violent attacks
against South Asian migrant workers in and around Manama on March 13-14, 2011,
immediately before security forces launched a violent crackdown on the anti-government
protests. Human Rights Watch spoke with 12 migrant workers who witnessed or
were victims of the attacks, all of them nationals of Pakistan and Bangladesh. Seven
of them said that Arab men armed with sticks, knives, and other weapons
harassed and attacked them at their places of residence. Some alleged that
their attackers were anti-government protesters, though they could not provide
information to support that allegation. All of the men interviewed said they
could not positively identify their attackers because they had covered their
faces with their shirts or masks.
The Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry, which
investigated human rights violations in connection with the government response
to anti-government protests, noted that according to Bahrain’s Ministry
of Interior four migrant workers were killed as a result of incidents related
to the unrest and a further 88 expatriates were injured, including 11 Indians,
18 Bangladeshi, 58 Pakistanis, and one Filipino.
Following a criminal investigation by Bahrain’s
Ministry of Interior, authorities prosecuted 15 defendants for their alleged
involvement in the murder of Abdul Malik, one of two migrant workers murdered
in front of a residential building in the Manama neighborhood of Naim. On
October 3, 2011, a special military court convicted and sentenced 14 of them to
life imprisonment. The fifteenth defendant was acquitted of the charges and
released. As of mid-September 2012 their convictions were under review by an
appellate civilian court.
Bahrain’s Reform Efforts
Even before it embarked on recent legal and policy reforms affecting
migrant workers, Bahrain provided legal protections to many migrant workers
that are absent in several neighboring Gulf states. Bahrain’s labor laws
and regulations have long applied to both nationals and to migrant workers
(with the key exception of domestic workers) and include the right of workers
to join trade unions. For example, Bahrain’s 1976 Labor Law for the
Private Sector standardized labor practices, including work hours, time off,
and payment of wages— but failed to protect domestic workers.
Bahrain’s penal code has also provided criminal
sanctions that can protect migrant workers against unpaid wages, and physical
and sexual abuses.
In 2006 Bahrain established the Labor Market Regulatory
Authority (LMRA) with a mandate to regulate, among other things, recruitment
agencies, work visas, and employment transfers. The LMRA’s duties include
issuing work visas, licensing recruiters, and educating workers and employers
about their rights and legal obligations. Its main policy goals include
creating transparency about the labor market and regulations, increasing employment
of Bahraini nationals in the private sector in place of migrant workers, and
reducing the number of migrants working illegally in the country. The agency
has developed an online and mobile phone interface that allows workers to
monitor their work visa status, and produces an informational call-in radio
program that airs on an Indian-language station in Hindi and Malayalam, where
workers can ask questions about their visas and LMRA policies. An
eight-language LMRA information pamphlet distributed to migrant workers upon
entry at the airport tells them how to apply for and change a work visa,
informs them of their right to keep their passports, and provides a Ministry of
Labor contact number to report labor violations.
On April 23, 2012, the National Assembly passed a new
private sector labor law, Law 36/2012, which King Hamad signed into law on July 26, 2012. The new law extends sick days and annual
leave, authorizes compensation equivalent to a year’s salary for unfairly dismissed workers, and increases fines
employers must pay for violations of the labor law. Under the new law,
according to the media, employers who violate health
and safety standards can face jail sentences of up to three months and fines of
BD500 to BD1,000 ($1,326 to $2,652), with punishments doubling for repeat
offenders.
The new law introduces a case management system designed to
streamline adjudication of labor disputes and keep proceedings to around two
months. Lengthy proceedings have until now made it impossible for many migrant
workers to pursue litigation to a final ruling since they were unable to remain
in Bahrain for a lengthy period without a job or income.
According to Bahraini media, Minister
of Labor Jameel Humaidan has said that under the new law domestic
workers “will be entitled [to] a proper labor contract which will specify
the working hours, leave and other benefits.” The government told Human
Rights Watch that the new labor law includes numerous provisions pertaining to
domestic workers.
Most of the law’s protections still do not cover
domestic workers, although some provisions extended to them under the new law do
formalize existing but previously un-codified protections for domestic workers,
such as access to Ministry of Labor mediation, requirement that a domestic
worker have a contract, and exemption from court fees. The law does introduce
new protections as well, including annual vacation and severance pay. However, the
new law does not set maximum daily and weekly work hours for domestic workers
or mandate that employers give them weekly days off or overtime pay. In this
regard, the law fails to address the most common abusive practice of excessive
work hours that domestic workers face.
In June 2012 an official with the LMRA told Human Rights
Watch that the agency had begun drafting a unified contract for domestic
workers that would standardize some protections, but did not provide specifics
of the contract. Ausamah Abdullah Al-Absi, head of the LMRA, told Bahraini
media that the LMRA’s aim was to guarantee decent work and living
conditions for domestic workers and the “unified contract will contain
basic rights of workers according to international treaties.”
Bahraini authorities also moved in recent years to reform
the employment-based immigration system, commonly called the kafala
(sponsorship) system, under which a migrant worker’s employment and
residency in Bahrain is tied to his or her employer, or “sponsor.” In
the past, the sponsor dictated whether a worker could change jobs or leave the
country before the period of the employment contract ended. This gave employers
enormous control over migrant employees, including the ability to force them to
work under abusive conditions. In August 2009, the LMRA reformed the system to allow
migrant workers to change employment without their employer’s consent
after a notice period set in the worker’s employment contract, which
could not exceed three months. Workers then had 30 days to remain in the
country legally while seeking new employment. In June 2011, however, the government watered
down this reform by requiring migrant workers to stay with their employer for
one full year before they can change jobs without employer consent.
Despite the reform of the sponsorship system, the LMRA
continued to reject most applications by migrant workers seeking to change jobs
without employer consent. Employers also continued to have undue influence over
a worker’s freedom of movement because they had to cancel work visas
before migrants could leave the country (unless this requirement was waived by
a senior immigration official). Moreover, the reform fails to cover the
country’s 87,400 domestic workers.
Bahrain took a number of
other steps to address the abuse of migrant workers including:
In November 2006, the Ministry of
Social Development established the 60-bed Dar Al Aman women’s shelter,
with a floor dedicated to migrant women. The facility took in 162 migrant women
in 2008 and 2009—most of whom were referred by police, embassies of
workers’ home countries, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). The
Ministry of Social Development did not provide 2010 and 2011 numbers in its May
2012 response to Human Rights Watch’s request for updates.
In July 2007, the government implemented a ban on outdoor
construction and other work between noon and 4 p.m. in July and
August—the hottest months of the year. Employers appear to have largely
observed the ban, primarily due to a campaign of sustained inspections by the
Ministry of Labor that demonstrated the government’s ability to enforce
labor standards when it committed resources to doing so.
Law No.1 of 2008 with Respect to Trafficking in Persons allows
the Public Prosecution Office to seek convictions against individuals and
corporations that—through duress, deceit, threat, or abuse of their
authority—transport, recruit, or use workers for purposes of
exploitation, including forced work and servitude. The Bahraini government
understands this law to criminalize many common labor abuses, including
withholding wages and confiscating passports. However, Human Rights Watch found
no evidence that officials have yet used the law to prosecute labor-related
abuses or labor-related human trafficking in Bahrain.
In May 2009, a ban went into effect prohibiting employers from
transporting workers in uncovered open-air trucks, which aimed to reduce
traffic-related deaths and injuries of construction workers and other laborers.
In January 2010, Human Rights Watch observed widespread use of open-air trucks
to transport workers, although in June 2010 we observed noticeably fewer
open-air trucks transporting workers from the same pick-up location we visited
in January. In early 2012 worker advocates acknowledged that the use of these
trucks for transporting workers had become rare.
On December 10, 2010, the Bahraini government released a
report drafted in cooperation with the United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP) on the status of migrant workers. The report included government pledges
to better protect migrant workers from abuse. These pledges came, in part, out
of dialogue between the government and Human Rights Watch in which Human Rights
Watch presented government officials with the findings and recommendations
contained in this report.
Human Rights Watch had recommended that the government
significantly increase the number of inspectors responsible for overseeing
private sector labor, health, and safety practices and, in response, the
government pledged to increase the number of Ministry of Labor inspectors by 50
percent. The ministry in fact increased the number of health and safety
inspectors fivefold, from six in 2010 to 30 in 2011.
Implementation of many of the other pledges, however, has so
far been weak or absent:
The government had pledged to launch an inspections campaign
aimed at “exposing employers who withhold wages and confiscate passports
and to penalize violators.” However, in February 2012 representatives of
the Migrant Workers Protection Society told Human Rights Watch that the
government had not initiated such a campaign and added that the onus remained on
the workers to report complaints to the Ministry of Labor regarding unpaid wages
and to the police regarding confiscated passports.
The government had pledged to initiate a campaign to inform
workers that withholding wages and confiscating passports are crimes under the
anti-trafficking law, to penalize employers that partake in these practices, and
to act on complaints by workers who alleged such abuse. In 2011, however,
authorities had not prosecuted cases of these and other common labor-related
crimes, other than physical and sexual abuse and sex-trafficking. Migrant
rights activists reported that as of February 2012 they were unaware of any workers
rights public education campaigns.
The government had pledged to “consider the adoption of the
… ILO Convention on the treatment of domestic workers.” In June
2011, Bahrain, along with other GCC countries, voted in favor of establishing
the convention, reversing its earlier opposition. As of this writing,
however, Bahrain has yet to ratify the convention, the necessary step to make
it binding.
Government Mechanisms
Addressing Abuses
Labor and criminal courts, and the Ministry of Labor’s
inspections and complaints departments, are designed in part to address worker
grievances and curtail abuses. Human Rights Watch found that abusive and
uncooperative employers often exploit the redress process, delay mediation and
court proceedings, force workers into unfavorable settlements, and avoid
punishment.
The Ministry of Labor had only 33 inspectors in 2010 to
monitor compliance with labor laws and health and safety regulations of over
50,000 companies that employ around 457,500 workers. As noted, the ministry
added at least 24 more inspectors in 2011. The head of the department of
inspections told Human Rights Watch in 2010 that about 100 inspectors would be
needed to conduct just one visit per year to every company. Migrant worker
advocates told Human Rights Watch in February 2012 that the ministry’s
total number of inspectors remains woefully low. Workers in two of the labor
camps that Human Rights Watch visited said that ministry inspectors had cited
their employers for serious housing code violations and ordered one of the
camps to close, but the employer never made the required repairs and, as of
January 2012, the camp that had been ordered to close in fact remained open,
according to local migrant worker advocates. The ministry lacked authority to
penalize companies directly for violations and instead had to forward cases to the
courts, which can impose fines.
Migrant workers may register complaints of labor law or
contractual violations with the Ministry of Labor’s complaints
department, which then calls on the employer to participate in mediation. The
ministry has no authority to compel a settlement, or for that matter employer participation.
Abusive employers often refuse to settle and ignore the ministry’s
request for a meeting. Although the ministry says it resolves about half of all
labor complaints filed by Bahraini and migrant workers, mediation results in
settlements for migrants significantly less often than it does for nationals.
In 2009, 2010, and 2011 Ministry of Labor mediators resolved only 30 percent of
complaints filed by foreign workers, forwarding the rest to labor courts. These
complaints mostly concerned violations of labor law and individual employment
contracts and exclude criminal acts such as assault, sexual assault, or human
trafficking. In all, the Ministry of Labor forwarded 2,321 of these cases to Bahrain’s
labor courts in 2009, 2010, and 2011, involving a total of 3,869 workers.
Labor lawyers and migrant worker advocates often advise migrant
workers to reach a settlement outside labor courts. Lawyers told Human Rights
Watch that courts often render worker-friendly judgments, but that cases take
between six to 12 months to resolve. Labor court trials comprise on average six
separate hearings that take place about every six weeks. Most migrant workers
have no income source during this time, and often feel they have little choice
but to accept an unfavorable out-of-court settlement. Many settle for a plane
ticket home and return of their passports, foregoing a sizable portion, if not
all, of their back wages. Some workers said they had even paid their former
employers simply to return their passports and cancel their visas.
Bahrain’s Public Prosecution Office, which
investigates and prosecutes crimes, has primarily pursued migrant labor cases
that involve physical and sexual abuse. Since passing anti-human trafficking
legislation, Law No.1 of 2008 with Respect to Trafficking in Persons, the
government declared its enforcement a national priority, but thus far the
Public Prosecution Office has only prosecuted trafficking cases that involve
prostitution.
Worker advocates and lawyers complained that authorities can
be unresponsive, and investigations and prosecutions are extremely slow in
criminal and trafficking cases. Advocates shared cases with Human Rights Watch
in which their clients—domestic workers—had suffered severe
physical abuse, and even rape. In one case, the Public Prosecution had not
charged the alleged abuser or completed the investigation more than a year
after the worker filed a police complaint. Authorities soon ended the investigation
altogether. In another case, authorities had not set a trial date more than six
months after the worker filed her complaint and eventually dropped the
investigation.
In a high profile human trafficking case in which 38
construction workers alleged that they were forced to work without
compensation, the first hearing was not called for about three months, by which
time the accused employer managed to persuade most of the complaining workers
to leave Bahrain with promises of small amounts of money and plane tickets
home.
Prosecutions appear to be nonexistent when it comes to
unpaid wages, the most common worker complaint, despite article 302 of the
penal code that criminalizes “unjust withholding of wages.”
Interior and Labor ministry officials appeared to be unaware of this provision
when Human Rights Watch met with them in February 2010. In March 2010, after
that meeting, Attorney General Ali Fadhul Al Buainain issued a decree mandating
criminal investigations and prosecutions in such cases.
Officials in the Ministry of Labor and the Public
Prosecution Office told Human Rights Watch they cannot address abuses unless
the workers themselves come forward to complain. Workers said they faced
obstacles to filing complaints and seeking redress, including a lack of
translators at government agencies, lack of awareness about rights, and lack of
familiarity with the Bahraini labor, immigration, and criminal justice systems.
For example, none of the workers Human Rights Watch spoke with were aware that
they had the right to hold onto their passports. Only one worker knew that he
could transfer employment without his sponsor’s permission. Many workers
did not know where to file complaints. Domestic workers are kept in
employers’ homes and find it particularly difficult to raise complaints.
Bahraini law does not require employers to give domestic workers any time off.
When workers do file grievances, employers often retaliate
with counterclaims alleging the worker committed theft or a similar crime, or
“absconded,” subjecting workers to potential detention in
deportation centers, deportation, and bans on re-entry. Several workers said they
did not lodge an official complaint because they feared an employer’s
retaliation.
In mid-2010, the most recent period for which LMRA figures
are available, some 40,000 migrant workers in Bahrain were working without
proper documentation because their work visas had expired, their sponsoring
employer terminated them, or they left their job (“absconded”)
without permission from a sponsoring employer. Other workers have active work
visas, but work for companies other than the company to which the LMRA issued
their visa, usually a shell company set up to obtain and sell visas. These
so-called “free visa” workers often do not register complaints with
the Ministry of Labor for common abuses like unpaid wages because they fear
deportation, imprisonment, fines, or other penalties.
Bahrain’s International Obligations
Bahrain is a member of the International Labour Organization
(ILO) and has ratified four core ILO conventions, including both conventions
relating to elimination of forced and compulsory labor, and those on the
elimination of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation. Bahrain
also ratified Convention No. 14 (mandating a weekly day of rest for workers in
industries, such as construction), Convention No. 81 (on worksite inspection)
and Convention No. 155 (on occupational health and safety).
Bahrain is a state party to relevant international treaties,
including the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of
Racial Discrimination (CERD), the International Covenant on Economic, Social
and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), the International Covenant on Civil and Political
Rights (ICCPR), the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of
Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the Convention against Torture and Other
Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT), the Protocol to
Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, and the Protocol against
the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air.
These treaties obligate Bahrain to protect migrant workers
against most labor-related abuses. Article 7 of the ICESCR recognizes
“the right of everyone to the enjoyment of just and favorable conditions
of work,” including decent wages, safe and healthy working conditions and
rest, leisure, and reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays
with pay. The ICCPR establishes an individual’s right to freedom of
movement, including one’s right to leave any country and enter his own
country. The ICCPR provides for security of person and, along with the CAT, the
right to be free from cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, requiring
Bahrain to investigate and punish acts of cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment
even when committed by private actors. In the Declaration on the Elimination of
Violence against Women, the United Nations General Assembly called on
governments to “prevent, investigate, and in accordance with national
legislation, punish acts of violence against women, whether these acts are
perpetrated by states or by private persons.” A state’s consistent
failure to do so when it does take some attempts to address other forms of
violence, amounts to unequal and discriminatory treatment, and violates the
obligation under CEDAW to guarantee women equal protection under the law.
In its General Comment No. 32, the UN Human Rights
Committee, the body of experts that reviews state compliance with the ICCPR,
declared that under the ICCPR’s article 14 “delays in civil
proceedings that cannot be justified by the complexity of the case or the
behavior of the parties detract from the principle of a fair hearing.”
Furthermore, according to the HRC, article 14 “encompasses the right of
access to the courts,” and that “[t]he right of access to courts
and tribunals and equality before them is not limited to citizens of States
parties, but must also be available to all individuals, regardless of
nationality or statelessness, or whatever their status, [including] migrant
workers….”
During the UN Human Rights Council’s Universal
Periodic Review of Bahrain’s human rights record in 2008 and again in May
2012, the UN Human Rights Council raised concerns about abuses of migrant
workers; in 2007, the committee of experts reviewing Bahrain’s compliance
with the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)
concluded that Bahrain should extend national labor protections to domestic
workers; and the Convention for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD)
committee in 2005 recommended that Bahrain take all necessary measures to
remove obstacles that “prevent the enjoyment of economic, social and
cultural rights by [migrant] workers.”
Although
the government of Bahrain has the primary responsibility to respect, protect,
and fulfill human rights under international law, private companies also have
responsibilities regarding human rights, including
workers’ rights. Consistent with their responsibilities to respect human
rights, all businesses should have adequate policies and procedures in place to
prevent and respond to abuses.
The basic principle that
businesses have a responsibility to respect human rights has achieved wide
international recognition. The UN Human Rights Council resolutions on business
and human rights, UN Global Compact, various multi-stakeholder initiatives in
different sectors and many companies’ own codes of behavior draw from
principles of international human rights law and core labor standards, in
offering guidance to businesses on how to uphold their human rights
responsibilities. For example, the
“Protect, Respect and Remedy” framework and the “Guiding
Principles on Business and Human Rights” for their implementation, which
were endorsed by the UN Human Rights Council in 2008 and 2011, respectively,
reflect the expectation that businesses should respect human rights, avoid
complicity in abuses, and adequately remedy them if they occur.
To the Government of Bahrain
Ensure speedy and full investigation and prosecution of
employers and recruiters who violate provisions of Bahrain’s
criminal laws, including withholding of wages and confiscation of
passports, and impose meaningful penalties on violators.
Ensure that Ministry of Labor mediation and judicial procedures
address labor disputes involving migrant workers in an effective and
timely manner. Ensure that employers who violate the law and regulations
receive meaningful administrative and civil penalties.
Improve the ability of inspectors to address violations of
the labor law and health and safety regulations, including by
substantially increasing the number of inspectors responsible for
overseeing private sector practices.
Extend all legal and regulatory worker protections to
domestic workers, including provisions related to periods of daily and
weekly rest, overtime pay, and employment mobility.
Ratify International Labour Organization Convention No.
189 on decent work for domestic workers.
Mandate payment of all wages into electronic banking
accounts accessible in Bahrain and common sending countries.
Enforce prohibitions against confiscation of
workers’ passports.
Address limitations on freedom of movement for migrant
workers by eliminating the requirement that a sponsor cancel a work permit
before a worker can leave Bahrain freely, and, in cases of abuse and
exploitation, eliminate the requirement that a worker wait one year before
they can change jobs without their employer’s permission.
Take stronger measures to identify, investigate, and
punish recruitment agencies and informal labor brokers who charge workers
illegal fees.
Expand public information campaigns and training programs
to educate migrant workers, including domestic workers, and employers about
Bahraini labor policies, with an emphasis on workers’ rights and
remedies.
Human Rights Watch conducted research for this report in
Bahrain in January, February, and June 2010 with the assistance of Coordination
of Action Research on AIDS and Mobility-Asia (CARAM-Asia), a regional network
of migrant advocate organizations.
Researchers interviewed 62 migrant workers in the greater
Manama area—Bahrain’s capital. These workers were employed in
various sectors including construction, service industries, and domestic work.
Of the 18 who were domestic workers, 15 were living in shelters and three in a
recruitment agency office.
Human Rights Watch also interviewed labor lawyers,
journalists, social workers, worker advocates, union leaders, representatives
of recruitment agencies, and foreign diplomats knowledgeable about the
situation of migrant workers. Four researchers visited two recruitment agency offices,
three construction sites, the government-run women’s shelter, three
shelters run by sending-country embassies, one NGO-run shelter, a judicial
hearing, and four labor camps where migrant workers are housed. They also met
with officials from Bahrain’s Ministries of Labor, Foreign Affairs,
Social Development, Interior, and Justice, as well as representatives of the
Public Prosecution Office and the Labor Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA).
Human Rights Watch followed up these interviews by
submitting detailed questions to the Ministry of Labor, the LMRA, and the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs in March, April, and May 2010, December 2011, and
May 2012. Those letters and the government’s responses are reproduced as
appendices to the Web version of this report.
Human Rights Watch provided the government with our findings
and recommendations and then held a two-day meeting in September 2010 with
representatives of the Ministries of Labor, Foreign Affairs, Interior, Justice,
and the LMRA. This dialogue resulted in the government adopting a set of
pledges, released in December 2010.
Most of the workers interviewed for this report had already
left their employment due to alleged abuses and filed official complaints, and
felt relatively free to tell their stories. Other workers who were still
employed and feared employer retaliation, or were victims of sexual abuse, or
feared deportation because they were working without a valid visa, asked to be
identified by pseudonyms, indicated by use of a first name and initial. Some
experts, including government officials, also asked not to be identified by
name.
In March 2011, while documenting human rights violations in
connection with the government suppression of pro-democracy street protests,
Human Rights Watch interviewed 12 migrant workers in Manama about attacks on
migrants as clashes between anti-government protesters and security forces
intensified. These 12 migrants were not questioned about other issues, such as
conditions of work. When this report refers to “workers who spoke with Human
Rights Watch” or “workers interviewed for this
report”—outside the specific section concerning these attacks—it
is referring to the 62 migrant workers interviewed about labor issues.
In December 2011 and again in May 2012 Human Rights Watch
wrote to Bahraini authorities requesting updated information pertinent to this
report. The government’s response, received on May 28, 2012, is reflected
in the report.
In July 2012 Human Rights Watch wrote to the five
construction companies mentioned by name in the report informing them of the
contents of the report and requesting their response. Two of the companies
responded; their replies have been incorporated into the report and are
reproduced in the appendices to the Web version of the report.
A Note on Terminology
The government of Bahrain does not consider foreigners
working in Bahrain to be “migrant workers,” due to their
term-limited employment contracts and temporary residence in the country. The
government instead uses the terms “contractual workers,”
“expat workers,” or “foreign workers.” Under international
law, the term “migrant worker” refers to a person who is engaged
“in a remunerative activity in a State of which he or she is not a
national.” Accordingly, Human Rights Watch considers foreign nationals
who live and work in Bahrain under term-limited contracts to be migrant workers.
The International Convention on the Protection of the Rights
of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families explicitly regards
“seasonal workers,” “project-tied workers,” and
“specified-employment workers,” who earn remuneration as a result
of their activity in a State where they are not a national, as migrant workers.[1]
Although Bahrain is not a party to the convention, this authoritative legal
definition of “migrant worker” applies to the workers whose
situation this report addresses.
Bahrain is a small island nation 25 kilometers off the
eastern coast of Saudi Arabia. About half the country’s resident
population of approximately 1.3 million people are citizens.[2]
The rest are mostly migrant workers. The government puts the number of migrant workers
in Bahrain as of early 2012 at just over 458,000, accounting for about 77
percent of the total workforce.[3]
In 1932 Bahrain became the site of the first commercial oil
discovery in the Persian Gulf. Over the past decade the economy has diversified.[4]
While crude oil production accounts for about 11 to 14 percent of the Gross
Domestic Product (GDP) and 75 percent of government revenue, the country has
emerged as a trading and investment hub, competing with Dubai and its other
Gulf neighbors.[5]
For several decades, Bahrain’s economic development
has largely depended on migrant workers, who can be found in every industry.[6]
Some of these expatriates work in skilled jobs, professions, or middle
management in fields such as finance, education, and import-export companies,
while others run companies and themselves employ and sponsor migrant workers. Roughly
85 percent of the approximately 458,000 migrants who are employed in Bahrain
work in low-wage and low-skilled jobs.[7]
Female migrant workers in Bahrain—about 80,300 in total—tend to be
concentrated in domestic work, with approximately 54,600 women working for
families as cooks, caretakers, and housemaids.[8]Out of
the 377,700 male migrant workers in Bahrain, 115,200, or roughly 31 percent,
are in the construction industry; another 23 percent are in retail and
wholesale trade; 16 percent are in manufacturing; 9 percent in domestic work;
and 7 percent in the hotel-restaurant industry.[9]Additionally,
some 8,200 migrants (male and female) almost two percent of the foreign
workforce, work in the public sector, including in the lower ranks of the
security forces. Another 1 percent work in finance; less than 1 percent work in
education.[10]
By comparison, the country’s workforce contains about
140,100 Bahraini nationals, approximately 34 percent of whom work in the public
sector. The
wholesale and retail trades, manufacturing, construction, and finance combined employ
another 38 percent of all nationals in the workforce.[12]
Bahraini companies and individuals “sponsor”
migrant workers using renewable employment contracts and work visas, mostly for
two years at a time.[13]
Once a work permit expires and is not renewed, the worker (and any accompanying
family members) must leave the country within one month, regardless of how many
years he or she has resided in Bahrain. By law, employers must bear the cost of
the repatriation.[14]
The workers interviewed for this report were recruited from
both rural and urban areas in India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Ethiopia,
Bangladesh, Indonesia, and the Philippines. Both male and female, their ages
ranged between 20 and 48 years old. Most non-domestic workers paid fees ranging
from US$750 to US$2,000 to recruitment agencies in their home countries to
obtain employment contracts, Bahraini work visas, and airline tickets.
Once in Bahrain, these migrant workers earned monthly wages
ranging from about 40 to 120 Bahraini dinars (BD), equivalent to US$106-US$318.
Construction workers interviewed by Human Rights Watch earned between BD60 and
BD100 ($159-$265) a month, while a few earned up to BD120 ($318) with overtime.
The average monthly construction industry income for male migrants is BD103 ($273)
(which factors in management and skilled workers as well as low and unskilled
workers).
The industry average for domestic workers is BD70 ($186) a month.
Domestic workers interviewed by Human Rights Watch earned between BD40 and BD80
($106-US$212) a month. Worker advocates reported monthly wages to be as low as
BD35 ($93).[17]
Many aspects of migrant workers’ lives in Bahrain are
closely controlled by their employers. Employers typically house their workers.Construction workers stay in dormitory-style
dwellings or labor camps, where employers provide transportation to work and
sometimes meals. Workers in manufacturing, retail, and other non-domestic
sectors might live in labor camps or group apartments that their employer
supplies, and for which they pay rent.
Domestic workers, about 87,400 in total, live in their
employer’s home and rely on their sponsor for food and other daily needs.
They perform tasks such as cleaning, cooking and serving meals, washing and
ironing clothes, shopping, and caring for children and elderly family members.
Employers exercise enormous power over domestic workers’ lives due to the
fact that domestic workers live and work in their homes. Under the sponsorship
system, employers dictate whether domestic workers may leave their employment
for another employer in Bahrain, or must return to their country of origin.
Legally, domestic workers are excluded from many of Bahrain’s labor
protections and inspection mechanisms. Many Bahraini employers view themselves
as the guardians of their domestic workers.
Bahrain’s system of employment-based immigration,
commonly called the kafala (sponsorship) system, exacerbates abuses
faced by migrants and impedes their freedom of movement. Under the kafala system,
a migrant worker’s employment and residency in Bahrain is tied to their
employer, or “sponsor.” In a meeting with Human Rights Watch, Dr.
Majeed Al Alawi, then minister of labor, stated that “the kafala
system is near slavery.”[21]
Employers unduly influence a worker’s freedom of
movement because they must cancel work visas before migrants can quit their job
and leave the country (unless this requirement is waived by a senior
immigration official). Until August 2009, employers also dictated if a worker
could change jobs within Bahrain before the employment contract ended. The
system gave employers enormous control over migrant employees and allowed
employers to force migrant workers to continue working in abusive conditions.
Now workers can change jobs without their employer’s consent so long as
they have been with that employer for at least a year.
In recent years, the plight of migrant workers in Bahrain,
as elsewhere in the region, has received increasing attention. Bahraini and
regional media, particularly English-language publications, have provided
coverage of migrant worker grievances. Hardly a day passes without a media outlet
recounting a tale of abuse and exploitation of migrant workers.[23]
Numerous worker strikes and demonstrations—mainly in
the construction industry and sometimes involving thousands of
workers—have raised public awareness regarding the scale of grievances in
Bahrain.[24]
“Most of the strikes happen when workers are not happy about the living
conditions, non-payment of salaries or low wages,” said Salman Al
Mahfoodh, secretary-general of the General Federation of Bahrain Trade Unions
(GFBTU), the country’s sole trade union federation.[25]
Bahrain is one of the few Gulf States that allow migrant workers to join
unions, although membership remains rather low.[26]
The GFBTU has nonetheless helped migrant workers stage strikes, and migrants
have also organized independently—including a strike involving some 5,000
workers against the al-Hamad construction company, in which the workers
recovered several months of back wages.[27]
Bahraini civil society organizations, unregistered migrant
worker associations, human rights organizations, expatriate cultural
organizations, and the GFBTU have also served as sources of advocacy and
information, particularly the Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Bahrain’s leading migrant rights NGO. Some foreign embassies have also
stepped up advocacy on behalf of their nationals by meeting with the Ministry
of Labor, providing lawyers and other resources for aggrieved workers, and
opening shelters for domestic workers.
Internationally, United Nations human rights bodies have
highlighted the treatment of migrant workers in Bahrain. UN Human Rights
Council member states raised the issue of migrant worker rights during Bahrain’s
2008 and 2012 Universal Periodic Review (UPR).[28] In 2007, the UN Committee
on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women expressed concern with
“the poor working conditions of female migrant domestic workers.”[29]
The committee called upon Bahrain “to take all appropriate measures to
expedite the adoption of the draft labor [law], and to ensure that it covers
all migrant domestic workers,” and “to strengthen its efforts to
ensure that migrant domestic workers have adequate legal protection, are aware
of their rights and have access to legal aid.”[30]
The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination in 2005
recommended that Bahrain take all necessary measures to extend full protection
from racial discrimination to all migrant workers and “remove obstacles
that prevent the enjoyment of economic, social, and cultural rights by
[migrant] workers.”[31]
Recruitment Process
Recruitment of migrant workers to Bahrain takes two forms.
The first involves recruitment companies in sending countries working on behalf
of, or in coordination with, Bahrain-based recruitment agencies that local
employers pay to find workers.[32]
This arrangement is the norm for domestic worker recruitment, but is also used
in other sectors.
The second practice, common in the construction sector and
other non-domestic low-income sectors, involves a migrant worker finding
employment through an informal middleman— often a friend, family member,
or acquaintance already in Bahrain. Sometimes Bahraini employers approach these
middlemen and ask if they know anyone who wants a job. Sometimes would-be
migrant workers ask their contacts in Bahrain to find them a job. One
Manama-based document clearance agent, responsible for submitting work visa
applications for Bahraini companies, explained:
The normal way is that the worker there back home tells his
friends to find a job for him. Maybe more than 80 percent is like this. Then
the friends living outside start speaking to the people, “Find a job for
my nephew, for my cousin, for my brother.” It’s depending on the
person, how active he is, and how connected he is.[33]
Bahrain’s Law No. 19 (2006), entitled Regulating the
Labor Market, permits only persons licensed by the Labor Market Regulatory
Authority (LMRA) to “carry out the business of a recruitment agency or
employment office.”[34]
This applies to employers who directly recruit migrant workers, as well as to
those companies that act as intermediaries in the recruitment process.[35]
Prior to 2006, recruiters required a license from the Ministry of Labor.[36]
Under the law, employers must pay certain fees to the
government for each foreign worker they recruit into the country. These charges
include a fee for work visas and residence permits totaling over BD220 (US$584).
In addition, employers pay recruiters, fixers, and document clearance agents
service fees, and provide workers with airline tickets to travel from their
home countries to Bahrain.[38]
The LMRA also used to charge employers BD10 ($27) per month per migrant worker.
This fee was designed to raise the cost of hiring foreign workers, making
Bahraini labor more competitive in the market.[39] Starting in April
2011, the LMRA suspended the fee, following intense lobbying by employers and
in the context of a far-reaching campaign of repression against pro-democracy
protests that some cited as crippling the economy.
Prime Minister Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa ordered a freeze on the 10 BD fee
until June 31, 2012 and on July 6, 2012 the government announced the freeze
would be extended until the end of the year.
Bahraini law explicitly forbids Bahraini recruiters from
collecting any of these fees and travel costs from prospective migrant workers.[42]
Officials with licensed and regulated recruitment agencies that place the
domestic workers told Human Rights Watch that they generally complied with this
law. However, when it comes to construction and other sectors, some recruitment
agents and employers appear to openly flout the prohibition by requiring that
prospective workers reimburse them for these fees.
For workers in construction, manufacturing, and other
non-domestic sectors, Bahraini sponsors or informal recruiters commonly solicit
agencies located in sending countries to handle the visa applications of
would-be migrant workers. These local agents compel workers to bear travel and
other costs. A Manama-based document-clearance agent told Human Rights Watch
that recruitment agencies or employers often have an office liaison in sending
countries. The agent added:
As per the rule, all tickets have to be paid by the
sponsor, [but] usually [the workers] pay for the visa and for the ticket. But
this is all under the table— officially nobody pays any money and nobody
takes any money [but] normally the agency has a placement fee, and it’s
two months’ salary, and then they charge the sponsor also here, which
they call recruitment fees. No way is this done officially, and if the sponsor
takes money then the [worker] can go to court and say this person has taken the
money.[43]
All but one of the 44 male workers Human Rights Watch
interviewed had the same experience of being required to pay up-front sums
ranging from $750 to $2,000 to their recruiting agents in exchange for work
visas and airline tickets. These fees are equivalent to approximately 10 to 20
months of most migrant workers’ wages in Bahrain.
Muhammad Rizvi Muhammad Siddeek, a 38-year-old Sri Lankan
driver, told Human Rights Watch he had come to Bahrain to earn enough money to
pay for surgery for his father and young son:
I paid money to an agent named Ali Zamir Employment Agency
in Katunayake area near my house in Sri Lanka. I told him I needed a job as a
driver. He said, I will get you a Bahraini visa and send you. I paid 83,000
[Sri Lankan] rupees [US$729]. I sold my wife’s gold for the money.[44]
Sabir Illahi is a 33-year-old mason from Rajasthan, India,
who had never left his home country before coming to Bahrain in early 2009. He
said:
I knew a man from Rajasthan [already in Bahrain]. He got my
visa. I paid 80,000 rupees [$1,725] for the visa. [To get the money] I gave the
papers to my land to a man [in India].
In Rajasthan, I got my visa from a relative. The engineer
of the company here [in Bahrain] sent the visa to him, that man gave the visa
to me. I gave him 80,000 rupees, and I got a ticket to come here, and a visa.[45]
Purveen G., one of 13 men from India working as a laborer
for a major construction firm, summarized their experience:
We all came through an agent, paying 50,000-60,000 rupees
[$1,300-$1,355] in India. This cost covered all expenses. We came directly to
the company once in Bahrain. Some of us mortgaged our properties, lands and
homes, with interest.[46]
Domestic workers whom Human Rights Watch spoke with seldom
had to pay the fees that other low-income migrant workers did. Instead,
industry practice is for the sponsoring family to cover expenses associated
with recruitment, including visa costs, air travel, and an additional payment
to a Bahraini recruitment agency.[47]
Nonetheless, in some cases recruiters in sending countries do force domestic
workers to pay fees. Fareed al-Mahmeed, chairman of the Bahrain Recruiters Society,
told Human Rights Watch that it was not uncommon for recruiters to charge
domestic workers fees in their home country.[48] Maria C., a
migrant domestic worker from the Philippines, told Human Rights Watch:
There was a recruiter who came to my house and offered me
and my family [a chance for me] to come to Bahrain. She said I would earn a lot
of money if I came here—money that I could use to support my family. She
asked me to pay her for my visa fee, my employment fee, [and] other fees before
I leave the Philippines. We paid 35,000 [Philippine pesos, or $756] in the
Philippines. [To raise the money] we sold our motorcycle. Then I came to
Bahrain. My sponsor picked me up from the airport and I signed a contract at my
sponsor’s house.[49]
While it is illegal under Bahraini law to force workers to
pay recruitment fees or to cover the cost of visas and travel, a study
conducted by the LMRA found that 70 percent of migrant workers secured jobs in
Bahrain by borrowing money or selling property in their home countries.[50]
Fee payments and debt contribute to an exploitative employer-employee
relationship. Workers who arrive with sizable debts—like Suresh Podar, a
laborer from Nepal—are less likely to feel they can complain or leave
exploitative work conditions for fear of losing their jobs and the right to
remain legally in Bahrain. Suresh, who came to Bahrain on his cousin’s
recommendation, said:
My relative was already in Bahrain working on my
sponsor’s boat and got me a job. My relative knew an agent in Nepal who
arranged everything. We gave him 30,000 Nepalese rupees [$425] and gave [BD]
200 [$531] to my sponsor when we got here. I wasn’t told I’d also
have to pay my sponsor. I was told I’d work in a garage as a helper but
when he got here we were told to work on a fishing boat. I can’t swim and
didn’t want to work on a boat. But since I already paid so much money to
get here I decided to stick with it.[51]
Making matters worse, some workers raise money at home for
the visa fees and travel by borrowing at exorbitant interest rates, sometimes
using family valuables or property as collateral. Suresh recalled:
I had borrowed the money from my brother. My brother had to
borrow the 30,000 [rupees, $425] from someone else and my brother has to pay
interest. I pay my brother. [After about two years] I have paid back 20,000
[$283] out of 30,000, but I still need to pay back another 40,000 [$567], so
60,000 [$850] total.[52]
Sant Kumar, Suresh’s cousin, said he had to pay
interest and offer collateral.
On average, for every thousand [Nepalese rupees, $14] I
borrowed I have to pay back about 1,300 [$18]. I borrowed 30,000 from one
[lender] and 30,000 from another. I put my house up for collateral. It’s
my own house so I don’t pay rent but if I don’t pay what I owe they
will take my house.[53]
Passport Confiscation and Mobility
Bahraini law prohibits employers from confiscating their
employees’ passports. The government has explained that the practice is
criminalized under the anti-human trafficking law and article 389 of the penal
code, but employers continue to routinely confiscate their employees’
passports, typically retaining them for the duration of employment.
All 62 workers interviewed by Human Rights Watch said their
employers had confiscated their passports on arrival in Bahrain. In 2008 and
2009, the Ministry of Labor’s Individual Complaints Department received
1,583 complaints from workers seeking their passports.[55]
Moham Kumar, India’s ambassador to Bahrain, observed that most cases of
passport confiscation take place at what he called “smaller companies.”
By withholding workers’ passports, employers exercise
an unreasonable degree of control over their workers and create significant
impediments to a worker’s ability to leave his or her abusive employer,
or return to his or her home country.
Rules governing how employers “sponsor” workers
and work visas exacerbate this problem. A worker who wants to return home not
only needs to repossess his or her passport, but also to secure the
employer’s agreement to cancel the employment visa. Migrant workers
unable to meet these official requirements for leaving the country risk
penalties for violating local immigration laws, including detention and
deportation.
Eight workers reported that their employers asked them for
money in exchange for returning their passports and canceling their work
visas—a common practice according to an immigration officer.[57]
Bahrain media reported similar stories of workers being asked to pay employers
before they received their passports.[58]Two workers interviewed by Human Rights Watch who filed complaints with
the minister of labor and labor courts became frustrated by the ineffectiveness
of the government’s remedial process and eventually agreed to pay their
employer in order to leave Bahrain.[59]Another four workers reported that their employers asked them for money
before cancelling their work permits so they could move to new jobs.[60]
After arriving in Bahrain from Bangladesh, Mukhtar Mojibur
Rehman learned there was no job waiting for him, even though he had a valid
work visa.[61]
Mukhtar’s recruiter told him that authorities would deport him if he
reported the recruitment fraud. Having paid fees to come to Bahrain, Mukhtar
spent several months trying to secure employment and worked odd jobs, including
a four-month stint as a vegetable gardener for which he was not paid.
Frustrated by his lack of steady employment and income, he decided to return
home.
I called up this guy who set up the visa and I told him,
okay, fine, I’ll go back. He said the sponsor wanted 500 dinar [$1326],
[he] won’t let you go unless you pay him. I told the man that I would pay
the 500 dinars. But then he said, “No, your sponsor 1722184809 wants
1000.”
I don’t know if my sponsor or my employer has my
passport. So, I know I need an out-pass.[62]
An out-pass is a one-time travel document issued by the
relevant embassy or consulate allowing a worker to leave Bahrain and return to
his country of origin. Migrant workers frequently must apply for out-passes
after failing to retrieve their passports. Mukhtar Mojibur Rehman described his
experience to Human Rights Watch:
I’ve been trying to get an out-pass. I went to the
Bangladeshi embassy two months ago to get an out-pass and they told me to come
back after two days. Two days later they told me there are 1,200 people
who’ve applied. [Three days ago] they told me there’s 200 left
[waiting ahead of me]. Once their papers are processed, yours will be done.[63]
Like Rehman, dozens of workers told Human Rights Watch how
they wanted to leave their employment and return home, often after experiencing
abuse or extended periods of nonpayment. None were able to retrieve their
passports and return home without help or paying off their employer. Most
workers tried to seek government assistance to retrieve their passports, a
process that can take between several weeks and several months, with mixed
results. Most who eventually left the country did so on an out-pass.
Immigration and Ministry of Labor officials do not have any
power to force employers to return passports.[64] Neither do the
police, at least not without a court order. Beverley Hamadeh of the Migrant
Workers Protection Society described what happens when workers appeal to the
courts to get their passports back.
Court orders are sometimes used to enforce the return by
the employer of the illegally held passport to the employee. The employer may
return [the passport], but fail to cancel the visa, which is critical for the
repatriation process. This often also occurs when the [Ministry of Labor] arbitrator
agrees with the employer to return the passport.[65]
Attorney Maha Jaber told Human Rights Watch that she had
secured orders for the return of her clients’ passports from
Bahrain’s Urgent Matters court. “It could take three to four weeks,
but as soon as I have a judgment we execute it through [appealing to the]
execution court,” she said.[66]
The government told Human Rights Watch that passport
confiscation is criminalized under the penal code’s article 389 and the
anti-human trafficking law.
Penal code article 389 specifically prohibits acquiring a
document by “force or threat.”
Nearly every workers interviewed by Human Rights Watch said that they had given
their employer their passport because the employer told them to, or told them
it was standard practice. All these workers said they were unaware that it was
illegal for an employer to confiscate their passports. It remains unclear
whether these types of cases are prohibited under the penal code’s
“force or threat” requirement.
Bahrain’s human trafficking law also provides criminal
sanctions for labor-related “exploitation” similar to forced labor.
Brig. Tariq Mubarak Bin Daineh, then undersecretary of the Ministry of
Interior, explained that it “is not [explicitly] in the human trafficking
law that holding the passport is a crime, but there is a trend now between the
police and the Public Prosecution to treat this as [the crime of] human
trafficking.”[70]
However, when asked about the criminality of withholding passports, Attorney
General Al Buainian told Human Rights Watch that the Public Prosecution had yet
to determine if confiscating a passport and withholding it was a crime or an
act of human trafficking—even when coupled with extensive withholding of
wages by the employer.[71]
Advocates with the Migrant Workers Protection
Society’s Action Committee said they were unaware of any employer being
punished for withholding a passport.[72]
When pressed by Human Rights Watch, officials in the Ministry of Labor,
Ministry of Interior, and Public Prosecution Office could not give any example
of punitive measures, criminal or administrative, taken against employers who
withheld passports. Nadia Khalil al-Qaheri, head of the Labor Complaints
Section at the Ministry of Labor, told Human Rights Watch that all her department
could do was either request the employer to return the passport or refer a
worker to seek assistance through the Ministry of Interior or the courts.[73]
Lt. Col. Ghazi Saleh al-Senan, director of Follow Up and Investigation at the
General Directorate of Nationality, Passport and Residence (i.e.,
Bahrain’s immigration directorate) in the Ministry of Interior, said that
when his office gets involved, employers either return the passport or claim
not to have it.[74]
One immigration officer who deals directly with these cases
told Human Rights Watch that he can only request—rather than
compel—employers to return the passport and release the visa.[75]
He calls the employers twice and then sends a summons via the police to appear
at immigration. If the employer ignores the officer’s requests after
three attempts—which the officer indicated sometimes happens—or
refuses to agree to release the work visa, the officer submits a written report
to a senior immigration officer, who is empowered to waive the visa cancellation.
But the waiver process takes weeks, even months, and workers still need to
either seek their passport through the courts or apply for an out-pass.
Lt. Col. al-Senan told Human Rights Watch that employers
“do not have the right to take passports.” He explained that if the
immigration officers receive complaints of confiscation, “We contact [the
employer] and ask him to return the passport.” He discounted the problems
this practice raises, saying, “The passport with the sponsor is nothing,
not an issue. If he wants to leave the country or transfer to another sponsor
the passport is not needed.”[76]
Contrary to Lt. Col. al-Senan’s dismissive comment,
passports remain vital documents that workers need, not only to leave the
country freely, but also to secure valid employment and residency in Bahrain.
The only way workers can leave employers and legally stay in Bahrain is by
changing employers. Starting in August 1, 2009, migrant workers in
Bahrain—except for domestic workers—could freely change jobs
through the LMRA without their employers’ consent. Ali Ahmed Radhi, then chief
executive officer at the LMRA, told Human Rights Watch that all LMRA services,
including employment transfers, could be done without passports using various
identification methods, even fingerprints. According to Radhi:
Provided that information regarding the foreign worker is
already in the LMRA database, the LMRA does not require the employer who is
applying for the new work visa to produce the original passport; a copy of the
passport would suffice for the purpose of applying for a new work visa.
He added that:
After the issuance of the work visa, the foreign worker
will eventually be required to produce his passport, not to the LMRA, but to
[immigration officials] for the issuance of the residence permit.[77]
However, several members of the Migrant Workers Protection
Society, as well as other migrant worker advocates, told Human Rights Watch
that they have difficulty accessing any LMRA or immigration services for a
worker without his or her passport.[78]
They also said that attaining a waiver of a visa cancellation can be complex
and time-consuming. Advocates complained of a disconnect between the simple
process described by top government officials and the bureaucratic obstacles
they encounter in reality when seeking assistance for their clients. Marietta
Dias observed:
If you go talk to the ministers and look at the law
everything is perfect and nothing can’t be handled. But when you go to
the little guys [in the ministries], the guys that process everything, they
either don’t have the authority to do anything or they haven’t been
told the law.[79]
Unpaid Wages
One of the main complaints that migrant workers voiced to
Human Rights Watch was that their employer failed to pay their wages in full or
on time. Unpaid wages are the most common issue in labor disputes mediated by
the Ministry of Labor, and a frequent reason for workers leaving employment.[80]
Media reports and migrant labor advocates suggested the international credit
crunch starting in 2008 may have exacerbated the problem.[81]
In April 2012, Indian Ambassador Moham Kumar told the independent daily Al-Wasat
that the largest issue currently facing Indian workers was non-payment of wages
for periods of several months, which he attributed to a struggling economy.
The Individual Complaints Department at the Ministry of
Labor, which mediates labor disputes between employers and employees, received
227 complaints of withheld and late wages in 2007, 792 complaints in 2008, 987
complaints in 2009, and 356 complaints in the first quarter of 2010, the most
recent figures available to Human Rights Watch.[83] The
government failed to reply to Human Rights Watch’s requests for 2010 and
2011 numbers. The Ministry of Labor also houses a department of inspections
that is charged with monitoring compliance with Bahrain’s labor law and
health and safety standards. This department, which mainly gets involved in situations
of large-scale non-payment of wages, received nine complaints specifically
regarding unpaid or late wages, out of a total of 203 complaints in 2008.[84]
In 2009, the number of complaints of unpaid or late wages that the department
of inspections received rose significantly to 140 out of a total of 371
complaints.[85]
Just over half of the migrant workers interviewed by Human
Rights Watch said that their employer had withheld their wages. This complaint
was especially common among construction workers. All of these workers were
still owed back wages when they were interviewed. Their employers had not paid
them any wages for between three and ten months. One domestic worker had not
been paid in five years. In a few cases, workers received a full or partial
monthly wage in the midst of extended periods of non-payment. [86]
Withholding wages violates the Bahraini labor law and is
also a crime under the penal code.[87]
Moreover, the impact on workers whose wages are withheld for even one month is
very serious: they immediately fall into arrears on debt they owe in their home
countries; they can incur additional interest; and they are unable to send
money home to their families, which depend on the income earned in Bahrain.
Unpaid workers must often run tabs at local stores or borrow additional money
from friends just to buy food and necessities.
Acihi binti Mahid, a domestic worker from Indonesia, worked
for her sponsor in a two-story house in the al-Budaiya suburb of Manama.
“I cleaned, cooked, and took care of three babies. I expected that the
sponsor could pay the salary,” Mahid told Human Rights Watch.[88]
Instead, she went unpaid for the entire seven months she worked for the
employer.
I was supposed to be paid 70 dinars [$186] as promised by
an agent in Indonesia. I expected to receive money from the sponsor every
month. I asked the sponsor for my pay so many times. He said, if you want to
send the money to Indonesia I’ll to give it to you … I asked so
many times but never got it. I need to send money to my family. I send it to my
father. My parents take care of my nine-year-old daughter.[89]
Lawrence Sarwan Singh, a 37-year-old tile mason, left his
parents, sister, wife, two sons, and a daughter in Mumbai to work for a
Bahraini manpower agency that supplies workers for building projects. Singh
told Human Rights Watch:
I was one of 46 men working for a supply company. We were
told we’d receive 100 dinars [$265] a month and up to 120 dinars [$381]
with overtime … We used to go ask for our salaries three days before the
salary was due. They would sometimes give us 50 dinars [$133] 0r 70 dinars
[$186]. They’d say it was a new company and whatever is left will be
given to you later … We had to sign the [receipt of full payment]. They
would threaten us and beat us to make us sign. The Bangladeshi foreman said if
we didn’t sign the paper, we would not get our salaries. Eventually I
didn’t get paid for a month-and-a-half. I called my employer and asked to
return home.[90]
Singh told Human Rights Watch that his employer refused to
send him home. “After he didn’t pay for another month-and-a-half, I
left,” he said.[91]
Government policies require that employers must show
receipts signed by their employee for each periodic wage payment before the
migrant worker can leave Bahrain.[92]
As Lawrence’s case demonstrates, abusive employers can easily induce
migrant workers to sign such documents through fraud or intimidation.
Every month, Acihi binti Mahid’s employers forced her
to sign for payments she did not receive.
I signed one piece of paper with seven signatures, once for
every month. I signed the paper myself; I understood it was to say I got my
salary. But I did so because the sponsor said, “Your money will be kept
with me till the end of the contract because no housemaid here keeps her
money.” It’s always kept by the sponsor.[93]
Since 2008, migrant workers from various construction and
other companies have organized strikes and demonstrations, drawing national
media coverage. One group of protestors worked for a large construction firm,
Muhammad Ali al-Asfoor al-Badyah Contracting, which was building several major
mosques in Ras Ruman and Isa Town, among other projects.[94]
On October 24, 2009, about 38 al-Asfoor employees demonstrated outside the
Indian embassy in Manama.[95]
According to a Gulf Daily News account, the
carpenters, painters, masons, and laborers had not received their salaries
(between BD80 and BD90, or $212-$239), for five months.[96]
The workers told the paper that they had been physically and verbally abused
when they asked for their due. “We … incurred the wrath of al-Asfoor,”
said Vishnu Naraya, who had been with the company 12 years.[97]
One striker, K. S. Prasad, told a reporter:
We are suffering as the company didn’t pay us for
five months … We have families and it is so difficult to convince them
that the owner didn’t pay us, as they think that we are working outside
India and therefore are earning a lot of money. They don’t know
what’s our condition here. We don’t get what we deserve.[98]
These strikers, all Indian citizens (joined by 4 more
workers for a total of 42), lodged official complaints with the Ministry of
Labor and the police in October 2009. In January 2010, they filed a civil case
and criminal human trafficking complaint against their employer with the help
of the Indian embassy and an embassy-hired Bahraini lawyer.[99]
Human Rights Watch interviewed three of the al-Asfoor
employees on February 1, 2010, all of whom said they had not yet received any
back wages, just over three months after they went on strike and first filed a
complaint with the Ministry of Labor.[100]
One of the workers, Sabir Illahi, said he came to Bahrain to
work as a mason in early 2009 on the promise of earning BD90 ($239) a month
plus overtime. After working five months for nearly no pay, he said, he left
al-Asfoor Contracting and tried in vain to recover his back wages and get permission
to seek new employment or return to India, first by appealing to the employer
and then by filing a complaint with the Ministry of Labor. The ministry
forwarded the case to the labor court. Illahi says he was left without income
for 11 months and lost his family home in Rajasthan.
I received only one [full] salary, and for the other months
I got BD27 [$72], but signed for the full amount. The foreman said,
“You’ll get the rest in two days, it’s not a problem, so just
sign it.” When he said that, I signed it.
After working for five months, I asked for my money but
they didn’t give me my money. [The site engineer] told me, “Do your
work; I’m not going to give you money. We’re only going to give you
money for food, BD15 [$40] for 30 days.”
I told him, don’t give me money for food, send me
home—I paid 80,000 rupees ($1705) on my house and I have to give it back.
He said, “There is no money, go to the Labor Ministry, go to the embassy,
you won’t get your money.”
I came [to Bahrain] and I can’t even read or write
much. I had never left my country before.
I asked him to let me go home, leave the salary but I want
to travel back home – but he said we won’t send you back. So I
left. Then, I told my sponsor, give me a release, so I can work somewhere else,
but he said “I will not give you a release, if you want to work, then
work in our company.” I know that I could earn money somewhere else if he
gave me a release, but he says he will not give me a release.
And I have children [in India], an old father at home and a
wife. I asked [my sponsor], ‘What are they supposed to do over
there?’ He said, “I don’t know what they will do, but you do
your work here and eat your food.”[T]hey’re out in the street in
India now, my wife, children, and old father. It’s been three months
maybe that they’ve been out on the street. That man I borrowed the money
from, he put them out on the street.
I have a debt. [The lender] said give he’ll me my
money, but I had to sign my house over to him; so now my land has become his.
He said if I pay the money back he will return it to me. I told him I would pay
him back in 12 months, but in 11 months he kicked [my family] out. He knows as
well that I have a bad employer here and that I don’t have any money, but
still, he put them out one month before he promised.[101]
Ahmad Alhaiki, director of Inspection and Labor Unions at
the Ministry of Labor, speaking about the al-Asfoor company, told Human Rights
Watch:
We have problems with him [Muhammad Ali al-Asfoor]. Not a
problem, a disaster. He uses different commercial registration numbers.
He’s under our focus. He is not cooperating. We are after him. But this
is a democratic society. It is not easy to file a case.… We have to give
warnings. We have to give notice. He’s holding [his employees’]
money, not giving people an adequate place to stay. This person, we are trying
to get the maximum against him.[102]
Despite the ministry’s claimed focus, and despite the
complaints lodged against Ali al-Asfoor’s company in October 2009,
workers continued to complain about the company, at least through January 2010.[103]
Only days before speaking to Alhaiki, the director of inspections, Human Rights
Watch visited a dilapidated labor camp used by al-Asfoor in the Adliya
neighborhood of Manama. Six construction workers there, all from India, told
Human Rights Watch they had not been paid in months.[104]
This was the same camp where the 38 striking al-Asfoor employees had lived
three months earlier.[105]
The new men Human Rights Watch met there were part of a group of 13 who had been
transferred from a mosque project in Muharraq in late January to Adliya to work
on a separate mosque project.[106]
“We don’t know why we haven’t been paid,” one said. He
added:
Our salary is 80 dinar [$212]. We get our payment in cash
every month from the foreman.
We were paid regularly for the first nine months. They
haven’t paid for four months. A week ago when we got one month’s
salary, [the foreman told us] our employer promised he would pay [the rest]
after a week.[107]
These construction workers had heard a rumor that a group of
men before them had gone on strike against the company.[108]
None of them had approached Muhammad Ali al-Asfoor directly about the back
wages, but said they thought their foreman had.[109]
Human Rights Watch asked if they planned to go on strike or file a formal
complaint over their unpaid wages. The workers replied that they were scared of
losing their jobs.[110]
All had taken out loans to come to Bahrain, some with interest, and some had
used their homes as collateral.[111]
By June 2010, the government took some measures against al-Asfoor (discussed in
the section on inspections); however, the labor complaint filed by 42 al-Asfoor
workers in October 2009 remained pending nearly a year later.
Human Rights Watch was not able to determine if the labor complaint was ever
resolved. The
company did not respond to a letter from Human Rights Watch seeking
clarification and comment on this and other matters.
Al-Asfoor is not the only construction company that had come
under Labor Ministry scrutiny. In June 2009, according to the media, around
over 5,000 workers went on strike at Al Hamad Construction Company alleging
they had not been paid for at least two months.
After the Ministry of Labor intervened and tried to broker a solution, the employer
agreed to recompense back wages and to pay future wages on the 15th
of every month. In November
2009, 2000 Al Hamad workers went on strike yet another time, according to the media,
claiming they had not been paid on time. Then
December 12, 2011, over 1,000 workers from Al Hamad Construction Company went
on another strike, alleging they had not been paid for seven months, forcing
the ministry to again intervene to secure a promise that the company would pay the
workers their back wages. One Al
Hamad employee told the Gulf Daily News that the latest strike came more
than three months after the workers filed a grievance with the ministry and did
not get any result:
This is not the first time the company hasn’t paid us. We
filed a case at the Labor Ministry and the Indian Embassy in September. The
officials promised they would sort the matter out and get back to us, but we
are still waiting for a reply. Ministry officials said they would solve the
problem mutually, but we didn’t get a good response from them. We thought to
sort the matter out through meetings, but we didn’t get any response from the
company or the ministry.
Low Wages
Bahrain has no minimum wage and the government has thus far
resisted efforts to adopt one.[119]
Some labor-sending countries have set minimum wages for their nationals working
abroad, and try to check that these rates are reflected in an employment
contract before out-migration is endorsed. The Indian government requires a
BD100 ($265) monthly salary for its nationals working in Bahrain; the
Philippines requires at least BD150 ($398).[120]
In reality, employers rarely meet these rates. Recruiters
sidestep the efforts of labor-sending countries to monitor wage rates in
contracts before workers reach Bahrain.[121] For example,
recruiters in India will avoid directly sending a worker to Bahrain, routing
them instead through another labor-sending country like Sri Lanka.[122]
Indian Ambassador Moham Kumar said in April 2012 that his embassy was trying to
be a party to the signing of employment contracts and had started asking Indian
workers to send their contracts to the embassy in order to get comments before
coming to Bahrain.
All of the Indians and Filipinos whom Human Rights Watch
interviewed earned less than the minimum monthly wage their governments
stipulated. Over half the Indian construction workers Human Rights Watch spoke
with said they were promised BD100 ($265) a month before coming to Bahrain, but
were told they would only be paid BD70-BD80 ($186-$212) once they arrived. A
group of 50 Indian workers told the Gulf Daily News that they received as
little as BD45 ($119) after arriving in Bahrain, despite being promised BD100,
and had to take extra jobs to make ends meet.
Ambassador Kumar similarly told the daily Al-Wasat in April 2012 that Indian
workers are promised a wage of BD100 but get closer to BD50 ($133 US) a month when
they start working in Bahrain.
The practice of employers or recruiters promising migrant
workers one wage prior the start the job, but actually paying a lower wage, extends
beyond Indian and Philippine workers. A Bangladeshi carpenter who asked to
remain anonymous said:
I worked for my company one year and I got 70 dinars every
month.
When I first came here I was told I would be paid 100
dinars but they paid 70 dinars. I asked the company about the difference. They
said they wanted to see how I work before they pay me 100 dinars. I’ve
asked over ten times in the last year for my full salary but they say the same
thing every time and tell me to wait.[126]
Migrant workers in all sectors on average earn BD205 ($544)
a month, less than one-third of the BD698 ($1852) earned by Bahrainis.[127]
According to the LMRA, migrant workers comprise 98 percent of “low pay
workers” (which the government defines as those earning less than BD200,
or $530, monthly).[128]
Domestic workers on average earn about BD70 ($186) a month.
Domestic worker wages have dropped almost every quarter since the start of 2008
when the monthly average was BD135 ($358).Around 48 percent of all non-domestic migrant
workers receive BD50-100 ($133-$265) monthly, while another 15 percent receive
less than BD50 ($133) monthly.[131]
In February 2008, between 1,300 and 2,000 construction
workers employed by the G.P. Zachariades company went on strike to protest what
they said were their poor living conditions and low salaries—between
BD57-69 ($151-$183).[132]
Some of the men, who worked on the $6 billion Durrat Al Bahrain project, a
high-end residential community that involves man-made islands, were Indian, and
Indian embassy officials told the press that they should receive at least BD100
($265) per month.[133]
A spokesperson for the strikers said, “We will not go back to work until
we get a pay raise because what we are asking for is fair.”[134]
The workers had also planned a march to the Ministry of Labor, but according to
reports the company shut the camps’ gates. One worker told the Gulf
Daily News:
We had decided to march to the Labor Ministry to discuss
our problems with them, but [company management] did not allow us to leave the
camp when they learned about our plan. They locked the gates and refused to let
us out. The company may be able to stop us from going out of the labor camp by
closing the gates on us, but they cannot kill our spirit.[135]
After the workers alleged that the company shut the
camp’s gates to prevent them from marching to the Ministry of Labor to
raise concerns, the ministry reportedly sent an inspector to talk with the men
and assess their situation.[136]
In May 2010 Human Rights Watch asked the Bahrain government to provide
additional information on any action it has taken regarding G.P. Zachariades,
but received no response. On August 7, 2012 the company’s managing
director, responding to a Human Rights Watch inquiry, wrote:
Our company constructed 320 villas … during 2007 to
2010. At the time this project started there was an unprecedented boom in real
estate contracts throughout the Gulf countries necessitating the importation of
a very large number of workers from Asian countries by all major contractors.
Many contractors were hit by the illegal strike organized by some of the
workers in spite of the fact that all of them had signed a contract of
employment with their employers and had come to work in Bahrain of their own
free will.
Addressing working conditions, the managing director wrote
that the company takes pride in “its commitment in implementing welfare
policies including high standards of health and safety for all our
workers” but did not provide details. Regarding wages, he added that the
company’s substantial number of employees who have served for over 20
years have seen their wages rise and obviously now earn much higher wages than
when they initially joined the company, and “more than the average market
rates as our company handles mostly projects of very high quality.”
He added that new workers continue to come to Bahrain “to work on agreed
wages,” without clarifying how the amounts the company currently pays
compare to average migrant construction wages.
Excessive and Forced
Work
Complaints regarding excessive work hours and workloads are
especially pronounced among domestic workers. Almost all 17 domestic workers
interviewed by Human Rights Watch said they worked 12-19 hour days, often
without breaks. One told Human Rights Watch:
I started working at five o’clock in the morning,
preparing breakfast for school and worked till 10 o’clock at night. If
the sponsor was in the house I have to work a full day from 5 [a.m.] to 10
[p.m.]. I had no days off and didn’t leave the house.[140]
None of the domestic workers said they had a regular day off
outside the home, but three said they had been promised days off before taking
the job. “I was also told [by the recruiter] I would have one day off,
but when I got here I was made to work every day,” said Maria C.
“No rest. [I worked] from 5 a.m. to sometimes 1 a.m. I sometimes sleep
only three or four hours.”[141]
Most construction workers and other male laborers reported
working eight-hour days and having Fridays off. Eight men reported consistently
working over 11 hours a day with no overtime, although Bahraini law requires
overtime wages.[142]
“I was originally promised eight hours daily work,
plus extra pay for overtime,” said Indian construction worker Lawrence
Sarwansingh. “I worked from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. I was not paid extra for
overtime. I was promised as much as 15,000 Indian rupees [$322] [base salary]
and 20,000 [$429] Indian rupees with overtime.”[143]
Sant Kumar, the fisherman, said:
[The agent] told me I would receive BD70 [$185] plus
overtime. But [my employer] did not give it to me, but when we came here our
boss told us it would be a fixed salary. Three in the afternoon we’d go
out to sea and, we’d return 3 a.m., sometimes as late as 6 a.m. And even
when we got back he would give us odd jobs, like repairing the net. We were
told we would work eight hours a day.[144]
Human Rights Watch interviewed one construction worker who
also worked as a night watchman at his work site in al-Riffa, an affluent
suburb that is home to many government officials. Rami V. said he took the
additional job because it offered BD20 ($53) more a month, but his employer
allows him no time off. “I have no brothers and my father passed away. I
must pay for all my sisters’ weddings. We expect to be mistreated here
but what can we do, we are poor.” Rami V. reported that he had had no
days off for eight months and stays on location 24 hours daily. He prepares his
meals on a propane burner but depends on friends and co-workers to bring him groceries
and he sleeps outside at the worksite, fearing his employer will hold him
financially responsible if anything is stolen.[145]
Representatives of Kerala Pravasi Study Center, an
unofficial association of workers from Kerala, told Human Rights Watch that
they had been in contact with dozens of workers also moonlighting as night
watchmen, all experiencing isolation, excessive hours, limited ability to leave
the worksite, poor accommodation, and limited access to food and other
provisions. Rami V.’s story, they said, was similar to that of other night
watchmen.[146]
Other workers reported that their employers forced them to
perform duties they did not want to do and objected to performing: some were
dangerous, as well as outside the scope of their original employment
arrangement. Muhammad Rizvi Muhammad Siddeek, a Sri Lankan personal driver,
remembered:
First week the sponsor was OK. Second week [the sponsor]
bought some dogs and five snakes. He brought them inside the house. One [snake]
was 16 feet and one 14 feet. The snakes are very poisonous and [pythons] are
very dangerous.
My sponsor says you have to care for the snakes every day,
change their water, and feed them. I said I can’t do this, I’m
afraid. If you have any other work I will help you but the snakes I cannot do.
He said, “If you don’t do this I have a friend who is a police
officer, I will tell him to come here and hit you.” I called my Sri
Lankan agent, I told them my problem. There was no response and he cut the
line. He never picked up my call again.
I could not return to Sri Lanka, I was worried [about money
to pay for operations for] my child and my father. I sold my wife’s gold.
I had bad debt. So I had to clean the snakes. I’m really afraid. But I
can’t go back.[147]
Suresh Podar, from Nepal, was forced by his employer to work
on a fishing boat, despite his objection that he could not swim.
I was told I would come for one job but I came to another
job. I was told [by the agent] I would work in a garage as a helper. But [I]
came here and he put [me] in fisherman work. Working on a boat and I do not
know how to swim. We don’t have a sea in Nepal. No one knows how to swim.
I got here and I told my employer. He said it’s not a problem. But he
never taught me. With all the work he never taught me. There was no safety
equipment, a tub or life jacket, on the boat. I fell in a couple times and my
employer pulled me out. I paid so much I stayed with it even with the problems.[148]
Accommodation and
Food
Bahraini employers typically provide accommodation for their
unskilled migrant workers. In the case of construction workers and other male
laborers working for bigger firms, this takes the form of dormitory-style
buildings, or labor camps, with shared bathrooms and kitchens. Smaller
employers sometimes house male laborers in shared apartments.
Labor camps are often cramped, dilapidated buildings with
insufficient sanitation, running water, and other basic amenities.[149]
Human Rights Watch visited four labor camps, all exceptionally meager. Three
were extremely cramped and dilapidated. At one camp some workers also
complained that their air conditioner was broken and their employer had failed
to fix it, even though summer temperatures reach up to 107 °F (42 °C)
with high humidity.[150]
We observed exposed electrical wiring and loosely-constructed corrugated metal
roofs at another camp. Up to 20 men slept in a room that typically had only a
small aisle separating 10 bunk beds. At one camp, workers slept on plywood
cots, and in another camp on thin mats on the floor.
A labor camp in Adilya housed about 40 workers for Muhammad Ali
al-Asfoor’s construction company. The largest room slept 20. Workers said
they slept on bunk beds with bedbugs.[151] There were only
two bathrooms, so workers kept water in plastic containers by their beds for
washing and drinking. The building was decrepit and falling apart, with exposed
wiring, crumbling walls, and cracked, water-stained ceilings.
A former resident said that the Ministry of Labor had
visited this labor camp the previous year and posted at least two notices,
three months apart, that he said declared the camp unfit and should be torn
down.[152]
A year later, when Human Rights Watch visited the site, the camp remained open with
about one hundred al-Asfoor workers still living there. According the Migrant
Workers Protection Society, as of January 2012 the camp was still open and in
operation.
Many labor camp residents complained about confined and
over-crowded quarters with insufficient amenities. Lawrence Sarwansingh, from
Rajasthan, who lived in a camp that Human Rights Watch did not visit, described
conditions there:
The place where we stayed was very old. It was an abandoned
[building], and then we cleaned it up. The company gave us beds. It was an old
place and had been empty for a long time. Depending on the size of the room, it
was five, eight, or ten men in a room. There was one kitchen for everyone.
There were only two bathrooms. I would wake up at 4 a.m. to use the bathroom to
get to work at 6 a.m. Everybody would line up at 4 a.m. There was one blanket
per person and one air conditioner to a room.[154]
In all three camps that Human Rights Watch visited,
researchers saw workers cooking food with kerosene burners. These have been
linked to several fires in labor camps, and the Ministry of Labor now prohibits
their use across Bahrain.At one of these camps, owned by a major
cleaning and maintenance company and housing 300 workers, Ministry of Labor
inspectors cited the company for violating safety regulations in 2008 and again
in the spring of 2010. Some two years after the original citation the employer
had still not replaced the kerosene burners with the approved gas burners.[156]
In response, several expatriate charitable organizations and NGOs operating on
behalf of migrant workers decided to intervene and in June 2010 arranged to install
safer burners without the employer’s participation.
Almost all domestic workers in Bahrain live in their
employers’ homes. With limited opportunities to leave the house, they are
completely dependent on their employers for food and housing. Two domestic
workers reported not getting regular meals. “There were two other
housemaids with me in one small room. One cook, one cleaner. I wasn’t fed
for two months. The cook would give me some food without our sponsor
knowing,” said Aumar Perdshe, a 45-year-old mother of three from Sri
Lanka who had worked in Kuwait for two years before coming to Bahrain.[157]
Physical and Psychological Abuse
Many migrant workers in Bahrain face physical and
psychological abuse. Of the 62 workers Human Rights Watch interviewed, 12 said
that their employers, supervisors, or recruiting agents had physically abused
them.
Physically abused workers reported being beaten, kicked,
violently pushed, and slapped. Physical abuse was often accompanied by
psychological and verbal abuse, such as insults or threats of further violence.
Some workers told Human Rights Watch that they were beaten after making simple
workplace “mistakes.” Dariah binti Narwita, an Indonesian domestic
worker, recalled:
The wife hit me with her hands on my head and side.
Sometimes I was slapped in the face. About 10 different times but I don’t
really remember. They hit me when I made a mistake. They would get angry if I
prepared the food incorrectly or didn’t put in salt.[158]
Maria C. left behind a four-year-old and six-month-old
daughter to work as a housemaid in Bahrain on the promise that she could earn
more money for her family. “I came because of poverty,” she said.[159]
She told Human Rights Watch she had never been outside her native Philippines
before. In Bahrain she was placed with an Egyptian couple working in the
country.
My madam hurt me. She beat me with her hand on my face and
body every time I did something wrong. I’m Filipino and I don’t
really know how to cook their food. In the Philippines we combine the egg and
the onion [at the same time]. They cook the onion first and then add the egg. I
didn’t really know that and my madam hurt me when I did it wrong.
Or sometimes the baby cries and the madam beat me, saying I
hurt her baby. I told her I would never hurt the baby, I have a six-month-old
daughter myself and I love this baby like my own.
After the first time she hurt me it came to my mind that I
want to go back to the Philippines. But then I thought if I go back to the
Philippines, what will happen to my family? I cannot support them if I’m
back there. But it was too late. Every day madam beat me.
She would say, “I don’t want to see you go to
the other room. Fix everything. Clean everything. Don’t take rest.
You’re my slave. You’re not my housemaid. You’re my
slave.” [She beat me on] my arms and my neck. She punched me, pinched me
and turned [the pinch]. One time she dragged me against the wall by my collar.
I told my sponsor, my baba [the husband], to send me
back to the agency because my madam hurts me. But he didn’t listen to me.
He got angry, hurt me, and slapped me on the face.
My baba is telling me that if I go back to the
agency they are not good. He’s telling me if I go to the agency they will
sell my body parts. They would rape me and beat me. So I was scared of my
sponsors and my agency.
Maria C. described repeated physical abuse for two months.
Her sponsors refused to return her to the agency. Maria C. secretly called her
husband in the Philippines and told him about the abuse. Her husband then
called the Philippines embassy in Bahrain. Embassy officials called the agency
that placed Maria and asked them to get involved in the matter.
[After returning to the agency] I still had my marks from
where they hit me and I showed my family all of my marks [over the webcam in
the office]. My family was all crying because I am their only daughter and I
have no brother or sisters. My family never hurt me before, only here I was
hurt. So when they saw I had been hurt my whole family was crying because they
never thought this is what would happen here.[161]
Suresh Podar, the Nepali man hired to come to Bahrain as a
garage helper but subsequently forced to work on a fishing boat although he
cannot swim, told Human Rights Watch:
From the start my employer gave me a lot of trouble. He
beat me many times like a football. The first time, [after] I was here about
three months, he beat me so much my face was swollen. We were repairing the
boat with the boss and preparing for going out the next day. My hands were getting
irritated from the powder we were using to repair the boat. The boss had
stepped out. I went to wash my hands but when the boss returned he saw I
wasn’t there and he got angry.
When I came back he asked me where I was. He yelled,
“Why does the powder not bother this guy [a co-worker] but it bothers
you?” I said the co-worker had already washed his hands, but just on
saying those words he got more angry and said, “I’m going to send
you home.” I said, “Fine, send me back.” I said as much as
that and he took a stick and started hitting me.
The next time he beat me badly was when another worker ran
away. The boss locked me in my room and told me I knew where the worker was and
wasn’t telling him. I said, no I don’t, and then he grabbed me and
kicked me in the chest and then the back.
Sometimes I couldn’t pull the nets up fast enough and
he would get angry. Once there was an eel in my net and he threw the eel at me
and I fell into the water and went under, sinking. The boss grabbed my hair and
pulled me back on the boat.[162]
Over half of the physically-abused workers we spoke with
said they suffered abuse after they tried to assert their rights. Acihi binti
Mahid, the Indonesian who came to Bahrain in late 2008 to work as a housemaid,
never received earnings for the entire time she was in Bahrain. Four months
into her employment, Mahid decided to demand her back wages.
I was expecting to receive money from the sponsor every
month. I asked the sponsor for my pay so many times. I ask[ed] so many times
but never got it.
My sponsor then promised, “After one year we’ll
give you all your salaries [sic].” But I said I’d like to get my
salary now because I want to send it to Indonesia. My sponsor became angry and
slapped my face with her hand … The following day she slapped the back of
my neck.[163]
Domestic workers like Maria C. and Mahid live and work in
their employer’s homes. Their isolation and the power the work
relationship gives sponsors means domestic workers are more likely to
experience physical abuse.
In some cases, recruitment agents forced domestic workers who experienced
violence or harassment to return to abusive employers. Police officials used to
return domestic workers to employers, but this practice has largely ceased
according to migrant advocates.
Human Rights Watch spoke with unskilled male workers, such
as Suresh Podar, who had also experienced physical and psychological abuse.
Sexual Abuse
Human Rights Watch interviewed four domestic workers who
said they experienced sexual harassment, assault, or rape at the hands of their
agents, employers, or employers’ sons. The number of Bahraini migrant
domestic workers who are sexually harassed or assaulted is not known; it is
likely that sexual abuse is underreported—due not only to stigma and
shame, but also fear of countercharges by employers, the isolation and relative
powerlessness of domestic workers, and obstacles that workers face in filing
complaints, including language barriers and lack of familiarity with complaint
mechanisms in Bahrain.[165]
Among the domestic workers Human Rights Watch spoke with,
harassment took the form of demands for sex as well as other unwanted sexual
advances and groping. Sri Lankan Aumar Predshe recalled:
One night when I was sleeping in the children’s room
my sponsor kicked me to wake up to go with him. It was two in the morning. But
I was scared and didn’t go. The next night he came and massaged my leg
from my ankle to my thigh. Then he massaged [pointing to her breast]. I said,
“I want to go, I can’t stay,” and he hit me three times.[166]
Other women experienced repeated unwanted fondling or being
forced to fondle their employer. Elma V. came to Bahrain in November 2009 and
worked in a home in Hamad Town. In January, Elma V.’s employer asked her
to massage his back. She told him that was “not my work,” but he
started shouting and so she did it. Then he took off his pants and made her
massage his legs, groin, finally making her masturbate him and ending the
masturbation himself. During this episode he was holding a small bread knife.[167]
Just over a week later her employer came on to her again.
“He locked the house doors and followed me around as I cleaned house. I
kept telling him I had a lot of work to do,” Elma V. said. First he said
he only wanted his calves massaged but then told Elma V. to move to his groin.
He again had a small bread knife in hand. “He made me remove my blouse
and he masturbated between my breasts.”
Two days later, at eight in the morning, Elma V.’s
employer made another “massage” request that escalated into an
attempted rape.
He ripped off my clothes. I was crying, begged him not to.
When I didn’t let him penetrate me he masturbated looking at me. After he
showered, he started talking nicely, how I should forget all what happened, he
would not do it again. But by then I’d planned to run away. Around noon
he left. I put some clothes in a bag and walked until I saw a Filipino. I
walked all night.
Madelle D. is 25, from Manila province in the Philippines.
She had been in Bahrain three-and-a-half months working as a domestic worker.
It was her first time employed outside her home country. She told Human Rights
Watch that on New Year’s Day 2010 she went to church with another
domestic worker employed by the same sponsor. After services, her co-worker went
home, but Madelle D. went to the mall. Upon arriving home late, her employer
became angry and took her to the agency the following morning. That afternoon
the agency manager gave her BD10 [$ 27]. According to Madelle D., he said,
“Take this. I help you because I know you need this.” She said she
accepted the money “but I did not accept what he did to me.”[168]
Later that night at the agency’s offices, she said, the agency manager
raped her.
It started at night, 11 o’clock. I went to sleep that
time and he made abuse to me. I am alone in the room but there are people
outside. His wife was not there. He told me, “I like you,” and then
he touch me. And then I said no and he said, “Don’t [be]
scare[d].”
He’s too strong because he drank, and you know the
man when he is drinking he becomes so strong. He scared me. Then he abused me.
After, he said to me, “Don’t tell your
sponsor.” I’m scared because they are [from] the same nation so I
don’t know who to trust.
Suicide among Migrant
Workers
Bahrain’s Health Ministry told the Gulf Daily News in
January 2010, that expatriates— just over half of Bahrain’s total
population—accounted for almost three-quarters of all suicides in the
country.[170]
Earlier that month, 22-year-old construction worker Suresh
Ravi, from Chennai, India, barricaded himself in a room, doused himself with
kerosene, and set himself ablaze.[171]
The same month, a domestic worker from Ethiopia committed suicide in her
employer’s home in the village of Aldih by drinking detergent and
swallowing pills.[172]
In another incident, Rajeev Philip, 33, used an electric cable to electrocute
himself at his flat in Salmaniya.[173]
In May 2010, four workers committed or attempted suicide in the same week.[174]
Human Rights Watch spoke with one domestic worker who had
cut her arm and wrist in what appeared to be a suicide attempt. Kanchana Padma
Kumari came to Bahrain from Sri Lanka in May of 2009. She worked for seven
months, but was paid for only about five weeks. She worked well over 12 hours a
day, she said. Her employer gave her inconsistent and inadequate meals and
would occasionally grab and push her. In January 2010, Kumari fled her employer
and returned to her agent. After two days her employer sent a driver to
retrieve her, but Kumari refused. Then the employer came himself.
He spoke with me strongly. He took my bag and said,
“Get in the car.” He promised to pay my old salary and give me
food. He told this to the agent but took me to his house and when I asked for
my salary he said it was a holiday.[175]
After several days Kumari still did not receive her wages.
She took a pair of scissors and slashed her wrists and arms.
I didn’t know what to do. Six months with no money.
Working hard. This was a hard life.
Kumari’s employers found her shortly after she cut
herself.
I was bleeding and my sponsor said, “I won’t
take you to the hospital till you sign this paper.” I signed six times
and then they covered and bandaged my arm and said, “Don’t show
this to anyone.”
Kumari‘s employer returned her to the recruitment
agency the same day. She had a fever. The agent took her to the hospital,
bought her new clothes, and called the Migrant Workers Protection Society,
which runs a shelter and provides advocacy services for abused migrant workers.[176]
As of June 28, 2012, at least 27 people had reportedly
committed suicide in Bahrain since the beginning of the year, most of them
migrant workers, including Indian, Pakistani, Nepali, Ethiopian and Bangladeshi
nationals.
According to the Gulf Daily News, “most of the cases involved
low-income workers suffering from financial problems.”
Indian Ambassador Moham Kumar told Al-Wasat in April
2012 that “in the last year [2011)] we had between 11 and 12 cases of
suicide, on average one suicide per month. But in 2012 we noticed that the
number of suicides [of Indian migrants] during the first three months was 11
cases, this means four times the average.”
Kumar said the embassy was unsure of the reasons for the suicide surge,
explaining, “We studied these cases and found that it might be a
coincidence, we must wait a little more, because the cases in 2012 were usually
connected to depression, or failed romantic relationships, or that there were
family issues. We are still studying more of these cases.”
At least two of the suicides in 2012 allegedly involved
migrant workers employed by the Abudulla Nass Construction Company. According
the Gulf Daily News, one of them, Pasupathi Mariappan, 33, a blacksmith,
was among a reported 128 workers stranded in Bahrain after a court imposed a
travel ban on them in 2006 when Nass filed a complaint accusing the workers of
absconding. The
court subsequently ordered the workers to pay compensation to Nass Company
ranging from BD400 to BD600. It is
a common practice for companies in Bahrain to get court-ordered travel bans for
debt-related reasons; persons under a travel ban are then also denied work
permits, so that they can neither earn any income legitimately in Bahrain nor
leave the country to find work elsewhere. Nass,
which did not respond to a letter from Human Right Watch seeking comment, later
lifted its complaint against more than 100 travel-banned workers under public
pressure. [184] (See
“Employer Counterclaims,” below.)
Bahrain’s Labor Law for the Private Sector (23 /1976),
last amended in 1993, regulated labor relations throughout the country until
July 26, 2012, when King Hamad signed the new law covering private sector labor
(Law 36 /2012).[185]
The Ministry of Labor is responsible for implementing private sector labor laws,
which apply to both Bahraini nationals and migrant workers. Domestic workers,
discussed further below, and a few other categories of workers remain excluded
from most protections found in both the amended 1976 and 2012 laws.[186]
The 2012 law offers largely the same labor standards as the
amended 1976 law, with notable exceptions discussed below. The laws regulate
maximum work hours, time off, employment contracts, payment of wages, overtime,
termination, handling of worker complaints, severance, labor inspections, and
collective bargaining.
By law, a Bahraini workweek consists of a maximum of 48
hours comprising six eight-hour workdays and one day off per week.[187]
Fridays are the official day off.[188]
A worker required to work more than eight hours in a day must be paid for each
additional hour at a minimum overtime rate of 125 percent of their hourly wage
or 150 percent for “nighttime work.”[189]
If an employee is required to work any hours on Friday or official holidays an
employer must pay them an overtime wage equivalent to 150 percent of normal
wage and grant a new day off.[190]
The government has thus far rejected setting a minimum wage.
In May 2010, the Shura Council, the appointed body that makes up half of
Bahrain’s bicameral legislature, removed provisions from an early draft of
the 2012 labor law that would create an official commission to consider
establishing a minimum wage.[191]
The 2012 labor law requires, as the amended 1976 law did,
that employment contracts specify employee wages and benefits.[192]
Workers “paid at monthly rates shall be paid at least once a
month.”[193]
Employers must pay all outstanding wages within seven days of terminating an
employer-employee relationship, along with a severance payment, or a
“leaving indemnity,” equivalent to half a month’s salary for
the first three years of employment and a full month’s salary for each
additional year.[194]
New Labor Law
In April 2010, the government circulated a draft of a new
private sector labor law. A committee comprised of representatives from the
government, labor unions, and the private sector prepared the draft law, and
the bill was subsequently amended by both houses of the National Assembly.
Bahraini media reported that on April 23, 2012 the National Assembly had
finalized passage of the bill, which, as noted, was signed into law by the King
in July 2012. Notably,
the final version of the law passed without any consultation with the General
Federation for Bahrain Trade Unions, which represented migrant worker interests
during the original drafting.
Some of the reforms introduced by the new law extend sick
days and annual leave and include a provision qualifying
unfairly sacked workers up to an entire year’s salary
in compensation. The
new law also increases fines for labor law violations from between BD50 and
BD300 ($133-$795) per violation to between BD200 and BD500 ($530-$1326) per affected
worker.
Moreover, employers who violate health and safety
standards could face jail sentences of up to three months and fines of BD500 to
BD1,000 ($1,326 to $2,652) per workers involved, with punishments doubling for
repeat offenders.
The new 2012 labor law introduces a case management system
designed to streamline adjudication of labor disputes. Under the prior private
sector labor law, the Ministry of Labor was authorized to mediate labor
disputes. As discussed below, these mediations have been less effective for
migrant workers. When mediation fails, labor courts under the Ministry of
Justice and Islamic Affairs adjudicate civil claims between workers and their
employers. Human Rights Watch found that these adjudications have been burdened
by lengthy delays, making it difficult for migrant workers access judicial
remedy. Human Rights Watch stressed to the Bahraini government in September
2010 that the case management system appeared to be one of the more promising
purposed changes and recommended its adoption.
The 1976 labor law allowed workers to file complaints with
the Ministry of Labor’s Individual Complaints Department, which attempted
to mediate disputes within two weeks before sending cases to labor courts.
Under the new labor law, if mediation fails, workers must file a complaint with
the Office for the Administration of Labor Suits (OALS), to be established
within the Ministry of Justice and Islamic Affairs.
An OALS judge would then have two months to conduct proceedings and present an
opinion to the parties to the dispute.
The two-month procedural window could be extended by a maximum of two
additional months upon approval by the president of OALS on the request of the
presiding judge.
The parties can reject the presiding judge’s opinion, in which case the
claim is forwarded to the High Civil Court, which must “conduct
proceedings in an expeditious manner” and issue a final ruling within 30
days of the first hearing.
This adjudication would be based solely on a review of the record of the OALS
judge; parties would not be able to introduce new claims or evidence.
High court rulings would be final and binding but subject to appeal to the
Cassation Court (Bahrain’s highest court).
As under the previous law, workers in labor disputes are exempt from court fees.
This case management system offers improvements for migrant
workers over the current practice. By placing reasonable timelines on OALS
judges and guidelines for the High Civil Court, migrant workers unable to reach
settlement with their employers should receive enforceable decisions faster.
Until now migrant workers and their advocates have largely avoided litigation
because workers faced trials of uncertain duration while being effectively
unable to work and without income. The new case management system thus should
strengthen a worker’s ability to seek redress.
One area of concern is that migrant workers, who often do
not have legal representation, could face additional procedural burdens because
it appears that, under the new law, workers must file their complaints again
with OLAS after going through Ministry of Labor mediation in order to refer the
matter to court. Under the prior labor law, complaints filed with the Ministry
of Labor were automatically forwarded to labor courts if parties did not reach
a resolution during mediation. It should be noted that the law enables the minister
of labor to establish new procedures and rules for mediation and the mediation unit.
The new labor law includes a section on migrant domestic
workers. On June 1, 2012, Bahraini media reported that
Minister of Labor Jameel Humaidan, while visiting New Delhi, said that under
the new law domestic workers “will be entitled [to] a proper labor
contract which will specify the working hours, leave and other benefits.”
Bahraini officials told Human Rights Watch in June 2012 that the new labor law
includes numerous protections for domestic workers.
The new law, however, only modestly expands the rights of domestic workers. Domestic
workers are not covered by the majority of the law’s provisions, as Article
2 explains:
With the exception of Articles 6, 19, 20, 21, 37, 38, 40,
48, 49, 58, 116, 183, 185, and Part 12 (Expiration of Work Contract) and Part
13 (Individual Labor Disputes), the provisions of this law do not apply to
… domestic workers/servants, including gardeners, gatekeepers, nannies,
drivers, and cooks that work for the owner of the work [place] or his family.
Most of the provisions that do apply to domestic workers simply
formalize existing but previously un-codified protections for these workers,
such as exemption from litigation fees, access to Ministry of Labor mediation,
and requiring employment contracts. The
law at the same time provides some new protections, including annual vacation, severance
pay (also known as “indemnity”), protections from undue
termination, and access to the previously non-existent case management system.
However, the new law does not set maximum daily and weekly
work hours for domestic workers, require that they receive overtime pay, or mandate
that employers give domestic workers weekly days off.
Nor does the law require work contracts to set these terms.
Excessive work hours are a common problem for domestic workers and the lack of any
provision safeguarding them from such abuse is a serious shortcoming of the new
law.
The law also does not establish any inspection regime or
monitoring mechanism for domestic workspaces, which in effect limits the
ability of the Ministry of Labor to enforce labor regulations applying domestic
workers. Domestic
workers are not covered by article 39 of the new law, which prohibits “discrimination
in wages based on gender, nationality, ethnicity, language, religion, or
faith.”
Ministry of Labor decree No. 8 (2005), entitled With Respect
to a Model Form of Employment Contract for Domestic Help and Similar Persons,
which is still in effect so long as it does not contradict the 2012 labor law,
provides some additional safeguards for domestic workers. The decree requires
employers to provide medical examinations, return airfare,
“adequate” food and “adequate” housing.
In June 2012 an LMRA official told Human Rights Watch that
the agency had begun drafting a new unified contract for domestic workers that
would standardize some protections but the official provided no specifics.[219]
LMRA chief executive officer Ausamah Abdulla Al Absi told Bahraini media that
the LMRA’s aim was to guarantee decent work and living conditions for
domestic workers and the “unified contract will contain basic rights of
workers according to international treaties.”[220]
Other Reform Measures
In recent years Bahrain has undertaken a series of reforms
designed, in part, to strengthen worker protections. Some of Bahrain’s
labor-related reforms are rooted in concerns about the cultural and political
consequences of having a population that is majority foreign-born and non-Arab.[221]
Other policies, including anti-human trafficking efforts and the summer midday
work ban, came in response to criticism from international institutions such as
the ILO, UN human rights bodies, and foreign governments, including the United
States.
The most significant change to Bahrain’s labor system
was the introduction of the Labor Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA) in 2006.
Law No. 19 / 2006 Regulating the Labor Market mandates that the LMRA issue work
visas, regulate manpower and recruiting agencies, and educate workers and
sponsors about their rights and legal obligations.[222]
The agency’s main policy goals also include creating transparency about
the labor market and regulations, increasing the employment of Bahraini
nationals in the private sector vis-à-vis migrant workers, and reducing
the number of migrants working illegally in the country.[223]
Many LMRA policies benefit migrant workers. The LMRA has
gone to great lengths to systematize the work visa process and makes extensive
use of new information technology to provide employers and employees with
electronically accessible information about pending visa applications, visa
status, and visa renewals. This includes a website operating in eight different
languages and a SMS text-message system by which workers can inquire into their
work-visa status and receive alerts when their status changes or is about to do
so.
The LMRA conducts educational campaigns. An LMRA
representative appears on a weekly morning program airing on a Hindi-Malayalam
radio station, Voice FM, where workers can call in and ask questions related to
their visa and LMRA policies. Occasionally workers ask about work-related
abuses outside of LMRA jurisdiction, such as poor accommodation, withheld
wages, or withheld passports; the LMRA representative typically instructs them
to file a complaint to the relevant authority (usually the Ministry of Labor).
An LMRA information pamphlet distributed to all migrant workers, excluding
domestic workers, at the airport explains in eight languages how to legally apply
for and change a work visa, informs workers of their right to keep their
passports, and provides a Ministry of Labor contact number to report labor
violations.
In 2011 Bahrain experienced prolonged political unrest
marked by mass opposition protests and a harsh government crackdown. In the
wake of these events, the government replaced several top LMRA officials after pro-government
forces singled them out as sympathizing with the opposition. Authorities accused
some these officials with corruption, charges that were ultimately dismissed.
As of July 2012, many of the agency’s programs and functions appeared to
be operating; however, the LMRA had not reported new labor statistics, such as
data on average wages or the number of migrant workers in Bahrain, on its
website since the first quarter of since 2011. The agency updated some
statistics in July 2012 to reflect fourth quarter 2011 figures. Previously it
had updated all its numbers every quarter to reflect the most recently
completed quarter.
The LMRA is not currently responsible for regulating
domestic worker visas. Bahraini media reported in November 2011 that the LMRA was
preparing to do so.[225]
Migrant rights advocates in Bahrain told Human Rights Watch that, as of
February 2012, LMRA had yet to extend its jurisdiction to domestic workers.
In June 2012 an LMRA official told Human Rights Watch that this was still
planned.
The LMRA is also charged with enforcing the prohibition on
employers, agencies, or other persons receiving fees or obtaining any benefit
from a worker “in return for issuing him with a work permit or in return
for the employment of such an employee or his retention in his job.”[228]
The LMRA law also required that employers bear the cost of repatriating migrant
workers at the end of their employment contracts, or after their work visa is
cancelled. These provisions also apply to domestic workers, under the authority
of the minister of labor.
In November 2006, the Ministry of Social Development
established the Dar Al Aman shelter, a government-funded facility run by a
Bahraini NGO and intended, in part, to provide shelter for female migrant
workers fleeing from abusive employers. When Human Rights Watch visited in January
2010, the shelter had a 60-bed floor reserved for migrant women. In 2008 and
2009, the shelter took in 162 migrant women, referred mostly by the police,
foreign embassies, and NGOs. The Ministry of Social Development did not reply
to Human Rights Watch’s request for 2010 and 2011 numbers.
Worker advocates told Human Rights Watch that police
increasingly take allegations of abuse seriously and do not reflexively return
domestic workers to their sponsors, but rather refer them to the worker’s
embassy, the Migrant Workers Protection Society’s shelter, or Dar Al Aman.
However, the 2011 US State Department’s Trafficking in Persons report
stated that “many police officers were unfamiliar with procedures for
referring victims of labor abuse and human trafficking” to Dar Al Aman
and other shelters such as that run by the Migrant Workers Protection Society.
Starting in July 2007, the government decreed a ban on
construction and other outdoor work between 12 noon and 4 p.m. in July and
August.[230]
According to the Ministry of Labor, inspectors made 14,348 visits to
construction sites throughout Bahrain in 2008 to enforce this ban.[231]
Then-Minister of Labor Al Alawi said that they found 14,014 companies in
compliance, while 334 establishments, employing 1,415 workers, were found to be
violating the directives and were reported to the Public Prosecution.[232]
In 2007, inspectors visited 3,383 sites; that year 472 companies, employing
1,641 workers, were taken to court and fined between BD50 and 300 ($133-$796)
per worker.[233]
The ministry has continued its aggressive inspections campaign monitoring the mid-day
work ban. In 2011, for example, the ministry conducted 13,386 on-site
inspections.
Law No.1 of 2008, with Respect to Trafficking
in Persons, introduced a potentially effective legal tool with which Bahrain
can combat abuses against migrant workers. This law allows the Public
Prosecution Office to seek convictions against individuals and corporations
that—by means of duress, deceit, threat, or abuse of
position—transport, recruit, or use workers for purposes of exploitation,
including forced work and servitude. However, Human Rights Watch found no
evidence that officials have used this law to prosecute labor-related forms of human
trafficking (as opposed to sex trafficking)—the US Trafficking in Persons
Report says that labor-related trafficking is the most common form of human
trafficking in Bahrain. The
law established a government committee that includes representatives of
Bahraini NGOs to implement and coordinate anti-trafficking policy, and mandates
that victims, when needed, receive psychological assistance, medical
assistance, and placement in a shelter.
In May 2009 Bahrain banned the transportation of workers in
open-air trucks to reduce traffic accident-related deaths and injuries of
construction workers and other laborers.
These trucks were linked to 326 accident-related injuries and seven deaths in
2006, and 117 injuries and four deaths in November 2008 alone.[237]
In January and February 2010, Human Rights Watch visited
areas of Manama used as pick-up and drop-off points for construction and
factory employees and other manual laborers. In January 2010 we saw dozens of
open flat-bed trucks transporting hundreds of workers. At most these trucks had
two benches running the length of the truck bed and plywood over the
workers’ heads. We observed a smaller number of workers riding in fully
enclosed mini buses with air conditioning and seat belts. Earlier in January,
the Gulf Daily News had reported an accident involving an open-air truck
in which several workers sustained injuries.[240] When Human Rights
Watch returned to the Manama pick-up locations in June 2010, researchers
observed noticeably fewer open-bed trucks transporting workers. In February
2012, migrant worker advocates corroborated these observations and told Human
Rights Watch that open-trucks are now rarely seen in the Manama area.
Sponsorship Reform
Under the sponsorship system prior to 2009, a worker could
only change employment with his or her sponsor’s permission, or at the
end of the employment contract. Decision No. 79 of 2009, Regarding the Mobility
of Foreign Employees from One Employer to Another (the 2009 Mobility Law),
allows migrant workers to switch employers without a current sponsor’s
permission. The Mobility Law requires a worker to give notice by registered
mail to his or her sponsor and the LMRA, notifying them of his or her intent to
switch employment. This notification period is set by the employment contract
and can range from zero to three months. Workers then have a 30-day grace
period after leaving their sponsor to secure new employment, during which they
can legally remain in the country.[242]
While the Mobility Law marked a significant improvement, this
was significantly undercut by a 2011 amendment, prompted by opposition to the
law from the business community, which requires a
worker remain with his or her employer one full year before changing jobs.
Bahraini officials claimed that the 2009 Mobility Law allowed
migrant workers to leave abusive or unsatisfactory work environments and granted
them more leverage to demand better pay and benefits.
However, only two of the 62 workers Human Rights Watch spoke with were even
aware of the law. (These two workers knew of the law from LMRA public education
measures and demonstrated great familiarity with the law’s requirements.)
Human Rights Watch spoke with dozens of workers who wished to leave their current
employers but did not know they could do so legally.
While
the 2009 Mobility Law had been crafted in
consultation with the General Federation of Bahrain Trade Unions, which
represents workers’ interests on the LMRA’s board of directors, the
June 2011 amendment was drafted without the union’s consultation following
months of political unrest and severe government repression of protests. GFBTU Assistant General Secretary Abdulla Mohammed
Hussain told Human Rights Watch in October 2011:
The decision was taken at a time when the [GFBTU] board of
directors was not meeting and we were not asked our opinion as labor
representatives. We had previously been interlocutors on the project. We
believed that workers should have been able to freely move jobs without
imposition but a three-month notice was added.
The new reform adds one year. The [political] crisis was
exploited by employers. They took advantage of the fact that the board of
directors was not meeting to pass the law.
At the board of directors meeting last month the government
presented it as a decision by the cabinet. The GFBTU asked if this was a notice
or was up for discussion. The minister of labor said this was a decided issue
based on decree.
Between October 1, 2009 and March
31, 2011, job changes invoking the 2009 Mobility Law comprised only 1.3 percent
of all employment transfers, benefiting around 241 migrant workers out of
17,979 who changed jobs during that period.[247]
Since the June 2011 amendment stipulated
a one-year requirement for any change of migrant employment, LMRA granted 43
migrant workers permission to change jobs without their former employers’
consent. This comprised 0.3 percent of the 11,636 job transfers by migrants in
the second half of 2011. In the
second half of 2011, the LMRA rejected about 98 percent of all applications for
employment transfer by workers seeking to change jobs without employer consent,
compared to a 28 percent rejection rate for applications made with employer
consent. Human Rights Watch was unable to obtain information about rejection
rates prior to the second half of 2011.
Besides its limited impact, another deficiency of the 2009
Mobility Law is that it fails to cover domestic workers. Ali Radhi, then head of
the LMRA, told Human Rights Watch that once domestic workers came under the
purview of the agency they would also be able to change employers without their
sponsoring employers’ permission.[250]
Even before the 2009 Mobility Law was weakened by the June
2011 amendment, union leaders and worker advocates voiced concern that the
law’s requirement of up to three months’ notice was too burdensome
for most migrant workers. Advocates argued that, in their experience, a notice
requirement as long as three months would likely deter low-income migrant workers
from exercising their mobility rights.[251] Despite the
government’s attempt to ease the notice requirements by allowing workers
to mail a notice of intent (thereby avoiding direct confrontation with their
employer), advocates said that most migrant workers “would not
dare” stay at a job after giving notice of intent to leave, fearing
harassment from their employer.[252]
The three-month stipulation may be appropriate for
high-level professional expatriates whose training and recruitment represents
substantial employer investment, advocates said, but employers can insert the
more burdensome three-month notice period into boilerplate contracts for
low-income migrant workers who rarely negotiate their contracts.[253]
In effect, workers who want to change employment because they are not paid or
live in sub-standard accommodation may be forced to stay at their abusive job
and face possible employer harassment for as long as three months unless they
can seek a court-ordered release.
Even if a worker is able to meet the notice requirements of
the Mobility Law, finding new employment and completing the application can
prove difficult. The LMRA claims that workers no longer need their passports to
change employers or access any other LMRA services because of fingerprinting and
other identification measures. Staff
of the Migrant Workers Protection Society, along with labor lawyers and social
workers, told Human Rights Watch that they experience difficultly helping
workers access any LMRA services without a passport.[255]
According to the LMRA, their agency only requires a copy of the passport to
transfer a migrant’s worker permit, but immigration authorities require
the actual passport to issue a new residency visa, which workers need to remain
in the country legally.[256]
Obstacles to Seeking
Redress
Language barriers, lack of awareness about rights, and lack
of familiarity with Bahrain’s labor, immigration, and criminal justice
systems can make navigating government bureaucracy difficult—and
sometimes impossible—for aggrieved migrant workers. Domestic workers face
additional barriers, as it may be difficult for them to leave an
employer’s home or to file a complaint, which in most cases means they
must immediately seek alternative accommodation. When workers do file
grievances, employers often retaliate with counterclaims alleging the worker
committed a crime or “absconded.”
Navigating Bureaucracy and Language Barriers
Many migrant workers lack information needed to identify
abuses against them and then seek redress. None of the workers Human Rights
Watch spoke with were aware that they had the right to hold onto their
passports. Only two workers knew that they could transfer employment without
his or her sponsor’s permission. Several workers were persuaded by
employers and supervisors to sign documents they could not read in the belief
that this was standard practice in Bahrain. A few workers did not know how to
make sure their employer did not renew their visas without their consent at the
end of their work term, thus preventing them from leaving the country. Workers
who had not yet sought assistance for labor-related problems had varying
understandings of what government assistance and other resources were available
to them. Most workers did not know where to file complaints and often seemed
unable to differentiate between the Ministry of Labor, which maintains labor
standards, and the LMRA, which regulates work visas.
The Ministry of Labor and the LMRA have conducted public
education campaigns. The ministry campaigns centered primarily on occupational
health and safety, and consisted of posters and brochures posted around work
sites. The LMRA appeared to have the most extensive worker-education operation
of any government entity, including a weekly Indian-language call-in radio program
focused on work-visa related issues.[257] Occasionally,
when triggered by a caller’s question about a contractual dispute, the
LMRA representative would refer a worker to the Ministry of Labor.
When Human Rights Watch met with them in January and February
2010, Bahraini officials pointed to a new LMRA informational
pamphlet—available in eight languages since of January 2010 and
distributed by the LMRA to every worker when he or she arrives in
Bahrain—as a key component of the country’s labor education efforts.
The Foreign Workers’ Guide, as it is called, introduces migrant workers
to LMRA services and instructs them how to legally apply for, maintain, and
transfer work visas to another employer. The Gulf Daily News reported in
May 2012 that the LMRA planned to unveil in the near future a new multi-lingual
guide highlighting Bahrain’s labor laws and
regulations in a bid to prevent exploitation.
The most recently version of the guide, available online, also
informs workers that they are entitled to keep their passports; that they
should not pay for work visas when changing employers; and it provides a
contact number for the Ministry of Labor for workers who have “any labor
problems with [their] employer.”[259] However, the
Foreign Workers Guide does not mention wages, appropriate work hours,
accommodation standards, the right to join unions, or what to do in situations
of physical abuse. The LMRA’s awareness campaigns are still relatively
new and could grow more effective over time. However, the authority’s educational
focus is presently confined to matters related to work permits.
Bahraini officials put the onus on migrant workers to report
abuses, and decry workers for their lack of knowledge. “The problem is
the awareness of the employee,” Ahmed Alhaiki, director of Inspection and
Labor Relations at the Ministry of Labor, told Human Rights Watch.
We are protecting everybody. This is our duty. The problem
is that no one reports to us. We have a hotline that anyone can call, we take
every case seriously and we protect the workers.[260]
The same point was emphasized by Nawaf Mohammed al-Mouada,
chief prosecutor in the Office of Public Prosecution, the government agency
that investigates and prosecutes criminal violations, including criminal abuses
against migrant workers and human trafficking. “As the Public Prosecution
we can’t know the situation of the workers and when they are not getting
paid because we don’t get complaints,” he said. “We have to
get a complaint first.”[261]
Migrant workers who seek assistance from a government agency
to file complaints, commonly the Ministry of Labor, the LMRA, or police,
sometimes find agency personnel unhelpful; they redirect the worker to another
agency and even turn the worker away before he or she can register a complaint.
Sawar Ram Bala took on debt of 75,000 rupees ($1,601) with
interest to come to Bahrain to work as a mason, and gave his wife’s
wedding jewelry as collateral. Since coming to Bahrain one year ago, Bala
received his BD85 ($225) monthly salary only six times. After one year, he
discovered that his sponsor had canceled his work visa without informing him.
On October 6 my friend was checking his visa status on the
computer. I decided to do it also and saw that my visa was canceled. I went
directly to my sponsor [asking for back wages] and he said, “Get [your
own] money to get a ticket and go back to India.” I told him I had a
contract for two years and if he gives me the two years’ worth of salary,
I will go back to India. My sponsor said, “I don’t have money to pay
you.”
Bala immediately attempted to seek help from the responsible
government authorities.
I went to the LMRA on October 8. I told them I
haven’t been given four month’s salary. And they told me my visa
had been canceled. I showed him my work contract to show I was employed. The
LMRA man told me the best thing to do is to go to the Indian embassy, get my
passport, and go back to India. On October 9 I went to the Indian embassy. I
told them I was owed four month’s wages. The embassy [official] said,
“Go to the Labor Ministry in Isa Town.”
At Isa Town they checked the computer and said my visa was
canceled. I told them I had salary pending and they said this problem
can’t be resolved. They said the best thing was for me to get a ticket
and go back to India. I said I had no money. They said, “What can we do
for you? Get it from your sponsor.”
Despite promptly seeking to raise his complaint, and seeking
assistance from multiple government authorities, Bala received no help. He told
Human Rights Watch:
Now I’m out and not working. I have no source of
income. I rent a [new] room and pay rent of 35 dinars. I borrow from friends,
here and there. If [my sponsor] gives me my two year’s salary, I’ll
go. If not that, then at least my four month’s salary and a ticket. If I
can’t get that, I just need my ticket.[262]
A major shortcoming of the current system is the absence of
any government office with sufficient recognized authority to resolve even the
most common complaints of migrant workers. Each government agency is empowered
to deal with only part of a complaint. The Ministry of Labor can help settle
contractual disputes, primarily non-payment of wages; police are responsible
for investigating criminal complaints, such as physical or sexual abuse; the
LMRA can help a worker transfer his or her visa to a new employer; and the
immigration department of the Ministry of Interior can assist with recovering
confiscated passports. Workers like Bala can find themselves stuck in an
endless round of referrals and visits to multiple government agencies.
Much depends on how government officials understand the
worker’s complaint and their authority to address it. Agency personnel
can mistakenly, or negligently, refer the worker to another government office,
or determine that there is nothing to be done to help a worker. Most migrant
workers Human Rights Watch spoke with have complaints that involve multiple
agencies. Human Rights Watch pressed ministry officials about whether their
agencies have developed internal procedures for referring complaints to other
agencies. With the exception of police referrals to the Public Prosecution
Office, which are legally mandated, Human Rights Watch found no evidence of a
standardized practice of inter-governmental referrals of migrant worker complaints.[263]
In labor complaints filed by workers with the Ministry of Labor, ministry
officials regularly failed to identify and report to the Public Prosecution
Office possible criminal violations by employers.
Adding to the hurdles faced by workers seeking redress is
the frequent absence of translators. Three migrant workers reported being asked
to secure their own translator and return to a government agency. Fatima M., a
Sri Lankan domestic worker, told Human Rights Watch that her agent beat her after
two different sponsors returned her. After the beating, Fatima M. ran to the
police station. At the station, “the police did not understand me. They
said, ‘Go and come back with an interpreter.’ I did not know
anything about [Bahrain]. I sat outside the police station crying. Later, two
Sri Lankan ladies saw me and took me to the Sri Lankan club.”[264]
Several months later, she was able to file a police report, but only with the
assistance of the Migrant Workers Protection Society’s Sri Lankan
advocates.
Bahraini government agencies do not employ translators to
handle questions and document migrant worker complaints. LMRA officials say
that most of their staff is multilingual and able to assist most migrants.[265]
Officials in the Ministry of Labor’s complaints department also said that
they manage with a multilingual staff, but acknowledged their work would
benefit from more translators. According to advocates with the Migrant Workers
Protection Society, government agencies almost never have persons on hand who can
translate for Sri Lankan, Ethiopian, or Nepali workers. The group’s
Action Committee told Human Rights Watch that local police stations often call
them to translate for migrant workers.[266]
“The language barrier is an obstacle [in
courts],” said Beverley Hamadeh of the Migrant Workers Protection
Society:
The verdict has been issued in Arabic by the judge
immediately in the cases I have attended, but the outcome is not usually
explained to the worker in his/her language, so it remains unknown until a
translator is found. In the case of one Ethiopian domestic worker who had
received facial burns from her employer’s wife throwing hot tea at her,
the [Arabic speaking] policewoman who accompanied the victim did not understand
the verdict even in Arabic. A court official managed to explain what the
written verdict meant in English and then we enlisted the help of one of our
Ethiopian members to translate it to her. She was in fact fined BD50 for lying.
The judge apparently claimed that she had done the burns to herself.[267]
Overall, migrant workers often have difficulty seeking
redress without help from representatives from foreign embassies, consulates,
lawyers, expatriate clubs, and the Migrant Workers Protection Society, who can
guide them through filing complaints, providing translation, navigating labor
mediation and trials, negotiating with employers, filing police reports,
understanding immigration procedures, and generally following up and advocating
on the worker’s behalf. In recent years, embassies of some sending
countries, including India, Indonesia, and the Philippines, have helped their
aggrieved nationals, including by hiring lawyers. Volunteer expatriate social
workers and the Migrant Workers Protection Society also assist workers and
serve as advocates in labor and some immigration matters.
Employer Counterclaims
Another common barrier to seeking redress is that employers
frequently file criminal or “absconding” claims against the worker
as soon as he or she complains. “The minute they leave to complain the
employer will go to the police station and say they ran away and stole
something,” said Noora Feleyfel, head of the Migrant Workers Protection
Society Action Committee.[268]
Several workers told Human Rights Watch that they were reluctant to lodge official
complaints because they feared their employers would make up criminal charges
against them and claim they absconded. “We cannot go to the [Ministry of
Labor] because our sponsors will say we ran away and stole from them,”
said Faisal Hameed, a construction worker from Pakistan. “We won’t
be allowed in Bahrain.”[269]
By filing criminal charges, an employer subjects the worker
to investigation and potential prosecution: workers who face criminal charges
cannot leave Bahrain.[270]
Police officials at the Ministry of Interior acknowledge
that this is a fairly common occurrence. Their procedure is to investigate and
refer cases to the Public Prosecution if there is evidence of the crime.[271]
Speaking about domestic workers, one official said, “We have many cases
like that. We check if there is evidence that the housemaid stole something.
Otherwise we put them in the shelter.”[272] According to
Noora Feleyfel, head of the Migrant Workers Protection Society’s action
committee, a worker charged with absconding can face detention and deportation.
Even if she was physically abused or raped, if she runs
away, she will have to serve two weeks in detention and then be deported,
unless we get to them first. People call them runaways, but they just left the
place of employment.[273]
The Ministry of Interior insists that migrant workers are
never detained solely for leaving employment or having cancelled visas.
“We assist and don’t take them to the court or detain them or put
them in jail unless there is evidence of a crime, and then we take them to the
public prosecutor,” said Lt. Col. Ghazi Saleh al-Senan, director of
Follow Up and Investigation at the Interior Ministry’s General
Directorate of Nationality.[274]
Government officials clarified to Human Rights Watch that they impose no formal
penalties for absconding. However, the government does operate a deportation
center in which out-of-status migrant workers are sometimes held prior to
deportation. Workers who overstay their visas also must pay a standard overstay
fee of BD15 ($40).
Workers who take on other employment while “absconding” can also
face fines, imprisonment, blacklisting, and deportation.
Human Rights Watch spoke with five workers who faced charges
of “absconding,” stealing, and/or other crimes after they fled an
employer due to unpaid wages or physical or sexual abuse.
One of these workers, Muhammad Rizvi Muhammad Siddeek, hired
as a driver, was forced to care for his employer’s dangerous snakes for
three months. During that time, he said, his employer slapped and hit him. He
told Human Rights Watch he called the police emergency number.[277]
Police instructed Siddeek to go to the Isa Town police station to file a
complaint.
I told them I did not run away, “My sponsor is making
problems for me and I want to change my sponsor.” The police officer
said, “Ok, you’re not a runaway.”
I went to my agent and he called my sponsor and told him,
“Your driver is here. You can come and retrieve him, but if you treat him
badly, you must release him.” My sponsor said, “Ok, I will
come,” but he didn’t come for about three days. Then he comes with
a police officer and in front of the agency they arrested me and took me back
to Isa Town police station.
According to Muhammad Siddeek, his employer accused him of
stealing a mobile phone, touching the employer’s wife, and “running
away.” Siddeek had two court hearings, one three weeks, the other about
three months, after his detention.
I spent about five months in jail at Isa Town police
station. I had a [second] court date on October 11, but before that, on October
1, I’m in the police station in jail and a police offer came to me and
told me, “Your case is over,” and my lawyer or someone can sign me
out and take responsibility for me.[278]
Ministry of Interior officials told Human Rights Watch that
criminal allegations by employers against migrant workers trying to leave
employment and file a complaint are common.
Migrant worker advocates say that since 2008, government
agencies, the police in particular, have improved their handling of migrant complaints.
Marietta Dias offered an example of progress:
Now the government of Bahrain and the police, after a long,
long time, have come to the understanding that if an employee does not want to
go back [to her employer], they do not force her back. It was the easy way out
that seemed most logical to them because sponsorship is like ownership. But
gradually [starting about a year ago] things are changing. I ask just that all
the police stations work on the same page.[279]
In addition to filing criminal counter-claims, some employers
accuse workers of “absconding,” which brings with it potential civil
liability. For example, the Gulf Daily News and two labor rights groups
reported that authorities arrested 50 undocumented workers in June 2011 on
absconding charges. According
to these sources workers had allegedly failed to pay their prior employer, Abdulla Nass Contracting Company, who a court awarded damages
ranging from BD400 to BD600 ($1060 to $1591) for each worker for
violating his contract by not showing up for work.
Reportedly 128 workers had “run away” from the Nass Company several
years earlier and subsequently the company filed a
complaint claiming the migrants had absconded from work.
The workers had also been hit with a court-imposed a travel ban stemming from
Nass’s complaint. The
Migrant Worker Protection Society noted that the workers had alleged that the
company had refused to pay them their full salaries.
In July 2011 Nass chose to drop the complaint for only
those workers who had “surfaced,” according to the Migrant Worker
Protection Society and the Gulf Daily News, after which the 50 workers
could be released and return to their home countries.
Following the June 2012 suicide of
one of the Nass workers, mentioned above, an international advocacy group, Avaaz,
collected over 20,000 signatures for an online petition aimed at pressuring
Nass to “adequately compensate” the workers and lift the travel
ban. Just over two weeks later, according to the Gulf Daily
News and the BBC, Nass lifted its complaint against more than 100 travel-banned
workers. Avaaz posted on its website what it said was a July 16
statement from Nass in which the company stated that following discussions with
the Indian embassy in Manama :
As a matter of goodwill gesture and with a view to
demonstrate their continued concern for the welfare of all of their workers,
Nass Contracting confirmed that, notwithstanding the hardship and the financial
and non−financial detriment being caused to the company over the years,
as a policy the company will not hereafter institute any legal proceedings
against run−away workers except in cases of criminal offence, if any,
committed by them. In addition, the company confirmed that it will withdraw all
court cases pending against run−away workers. The above would enable the
affected Indian workers to leave Bahrain at the earliest.
Undocumented Workers
Some 40,000 migrant workers in Bahrain work without proper
documentation either because their work visas have expired, they were dismissed
by their sponsoring employers, or they left their job without permission from
sponsoring employers.[289]
Other workers may have active work visas but work for companies other than that
for which the LMRA issued their visa, usually a shell company set up to obtain
and sell visas. These workers are often called “free visa” workers.
Free visa workers who spoke with Human Rights Watch said
they did not register complaints with the Ministry of Labor for common abuses
like unpaid wages because they feared deportation or fines if they did so.
Ministry officials assured Human Rights Watch that they do not take a
worker’s legal status into account when arbitrating a complaint. However,
the government has actively targeted unlicensed workers for deportation in
recent years. As Amr Selim, LMRA’s customer relations
manager, told migrant workers listening to a LMRA informational radio
program in 2012:
We don’t want people to stay in the country illegally
… [partly because] we don’t want them to get exploited …
[Still] if LMRA inspectors catch you working without a work permit, at all,
[either] because you had one but it expired or you don’t have one at all,
[as in] you over-stayed your visitor’s visa or you over-stayed your [work
visa] cancellation. Whatever the reason, you will be prosecuted. The case goes
to court and the court has the liberty to give you a heavy judgment. It could
be a fine and imprisonment, fine or imprisonment, or fine, imprisonment, blacklisting
and … deportation.
The LMRA has set up several amnesty periods since 2006,
allowing undocumented migrant workers to leave Bahrain without incurring any
penalties associated with overstaying their visas.
Limited Mobility of Domestic Workers
Domestic workers are kept in employers’ homes without
breaks, vacation time, or weekly days off and can be under constant
supervision, making it particularly difficult for them to complain. Bahraini
law does not require employers to give domestic workers any time off.
Abused domestic workers who do manage to leave employment
often seek refuge and assistance from their recruitment agencies. However, some
agencies return domestic workers to the homes from which they fled. A standard
contract between recruiters and employers specifies that a recruiter must offer
an employer a full refund of any expenses and fees they paid if the domestic
worker proves “unsatisfactory” to the employer. This practice
creates an incentive for some recruitment agencies to return workers to abusive
employers.
Dariah binti Narwita worked five months without pay before
fleeing to the Indonesian consulate, which sought assistance from her
recruitment agency. “I told them the sponsor is not good, but Al Kadasia
[manpower agency] returned me to the sponsor,” she said.[291]
Dariah’s employer became physically abusive upon her return, but she was
forced to wait three months before she had the chance to flee again.[292]
Government Mechanisms
Addressing Labor Disputes
While Bahrain’s labor laws appear to provide a range
of protections for non-domestic migrant workers, enforcement of these laws has
been mixed. It is apparent from the cases that Human Rights Watch examined, as
well as those reported by media, that government agencies’ or the
judiciary’s handling of such cases frequently leaves much to be desired.
Inspections
The Department of Inspections at the Ministry of Labor has
two types of inspectors. Labor inspectors look for labor law violations,
including whether workers are being paid, being forced to work excessive hours,
and have proper visas. Health and safety inspectors look for violations of the
health and safety code. These inspectors visit work sites, labor camps, and
recruitment agencies, usually unannounced.
On occasion, the Department of Inspections runs campaigns
targeting specific practices or industries. Recent examples include a campaign
monitoring compliance with the ban on midday outdoor work in July and
August—an effort recognized for convincing employers to comply with the
ban.[293]
Additionally, a campaign targeting labor recruitment agencies led to the
closure of dozens of agencies for abusive and illegal practices, yet volunteers
from the Migrant Workers Protection Society stress that numerous abusive
agencies still operate. [294]
Ministry inspectors can also intervene in cases of strikes and complaints by groups
of workers.
In 2010 the department had 27 labor inspectors and six
health and safety inspectors. According to the head of the Department of
Inspections, Ahmed Alhaiki, in 2010 there were over 50,000 companies in
Bahrain, and “our goal is that every company is inspected once a
year.” However, he observed that he would need 100 inspectors to achieve
this aim.[295]
The Department of Inspections increased the number of health and safety
inspectors from six to 30 in 2011. Migrant worker advocates note that
“this figure remains woefully inadequate” for carrying out worksite
and accommodation inspections. Human Rights Watch has not been able to
determine whether the Ministry of Labor has increased further the number of labor
inspectors it employs. The government did not include this information in its
response to a request for updates from Human Rights Watch.
In 2011 the department of inspections conducted 17,853
on-site inspections, 75 percent of which were to enforce the summer mid-day
work ban. In
all, these site inspections resulted in the department issuing 1,549 warnings, 40
citations for violations and placing 312 sites on its watch-list.
The department also inspected 357 worker accommodations in 2011, issuing 28
warnings, 23 citations for violations, and granting 90 facilities a grace
period to comply with housing codes.
Human Rights Watch visited two labor camps that the Department
of Inspections had previously visited and cited for health and safety
violations. According to workers at the sites, the ministry had not followed up
on those citations to ensure enforcement, effectively allowing employers to
prolong these dangerous and illegal practices.
A major cleaning and maintenance company housed 300 workers
at a camp in Barbar. In May 2008, the Ministry of Labor visited the site.
“It was after a big fire at another camp in Bahrain,” said Asif S.,
who had lived in the camp for over seven years. “They were visiting many
labor camps. The ministry came here and said there was a problem with the
ventilation and the burners, and the company should fix it.”[299]
Workers in the camp cooked their food on kerosene burners. The ministry deems this
practice a major fire hazard and prohibits use of kerosene burners in labor
camps. Despite the ministry’s original citation, the burners remained in
place when Human Rights Watch visited more than two years later, in June 2010.
“Two months ago the ministry came again, and told the company again, that
the kerosene burners are not allowed,” Asif S. said.[300]
Human Rights Watch counted around 50 burners in one location during a visit to
this camp in June 2010, ten of which were in use.
Even when the Department of Inspection actively follows up
on a violation, it has no authority to impose fines. Inspectors can issue
citations and warnings, but if an employer refuses to comply, the ministry can
only forward the case to a labor court where a trial will take at least six
months and will likely be appealed. “Inspections cases can take two
years,” Alhaiki said.[301]
Furthermore, under the amended 1976 labor law fines (which were
tallied on a per-worker, per-violation basis) could be hefty when violations
involve numerous workers, but were insufficient for serious violations
involving only a few workers. “The problem here is that in our labor laws
the amount of penalties is not fair,” said Abdullah Ali Makki, head of
occupational health and safety for the Ministry of Labor in February 2010.
“It is not fair at all, because you are talking about a BD50 to BD300
($132-$796) maximum penalty. This was fair enough during the 1970s when it was
introduced, but now it is not.”[302] The new labor law
passed in April 2012 reportedly increased the fines to between BD200 and BD500
($530-$1,326).
Another avenue the Inspections Department has for dealing
with severe violators is requesting that the Ministry of Industry and Commerce
revoke a company’s commercial registration, in theory closing the
business and ending the employer’s ability to recruit more workers from
abroad.[304]
In practice, employers often reopen their business under a new commercial
registration acquired in the name of a family member.
Additional commercial registrations can also be used to
apply for more work visas, as in the case of Ali al-Asfoor, who operated under
seven different commercial registration numbers. As previously noted, ministry
inspectors ordered him to demolish his substandard labor camp in Adliya, but it
was still open over a year later. Forty-two of his workers also alleged they
had not received their wages for months and filed labor complaints and criminal
charges. Workers still employed by al-Asfoor reported not getting paid even
after proceedings had begun. It is not clear whether al-Asfoor was ever
inspected for labor violations such as withholding wages. In June 2010, Alhaiki
told Human Rights Watch that the Department of Inspections had revoked Muhammad
Ali al-Asfoor’s seven commercial registration numbers, but did not
indicate the exact reasons for the action.[306] The government
provided no updates as to the status of civil and criminal claims against Ali
al-Asfoor, and Human Rights Watch was unable to determine whether he continues
to operate illegally, although, as noted earlier, as of January 2012 the Adliya
camp was still open and in operation.
The Ministry of Labor told Human Rights Watch that their
inspectors have had success in resolving large strikes and cases of unpaid
wages for numerous workers from some companies.
For example, the Gulf Daily News reported that 150 workers filed
complaints on January 31, 2010 and 400 workers did the same on February 25,
2010 for unpaid wages against a South Korean contractor for a major government
project, the Isa Town flyover. In
both cases, according to the Gulf Daily News, after filing complaints
workers received their back pay in a timely manner.
Migrant worker advocates have said that the Department of Inspections can at
times be helpful at dealing with labor disputes.
However, even the ministry’s intervention does not
always effectively address the labor abuses. For example, the Gulf Daily
News reported that 70 migrant construction workers from the Senior Group of
Companies filed complaints with the Ministry of Labor on September 7, 2011,
alleging they had not been paid in eight months; another 40 Senior Group
workers reportedly demonstrated on November 15 outside the Ministry of Labor
complaining that they had not been paid in seven months.
Ministry officials intervened and confirmed that the Senior
Group had not paid workers for seven months. The ministry’s
involvement resulted in a settlement of one month’s back pay for each
worker plus a promise by the employer to resume paying wages and to pay the remaining
back wages at the end of the year. According
to the Migrant Workers Protection Society, most Senior Group workers accepted a
plane ticket home as part of the settlement, leaving their bank account details
with the company on the promise that their unpaid salaries would be forwarded
to them. Worker
advocates say this type of arrangement, where workers are sent home on a promise
of future payment, is not uncommon in labor disputes.
The arrangement usually ends with the worker not receiving the settlement, as
they become isolated in their home country and find it hard or not worthwhile
to follow up on the issue. Upon
hearing that a group of Senior Group workers had returned home, Migrant Workers
Protection Society advocates tried to get them a lawyer with power of attorney,
but the Indian Embassy, which was making the arrangements, lost contact with
the workers.
In response to an inquiry from Human Rights Watch, the
managing director of the Senior Group wrote that “the global financial
crisis” and “internal problems in the Kingdom of Bahrain” had
affected the Senior Group along with other firms, and that the company
“tried its best to solve the issues at all times. The company “is paying
the wages on time,” he wrote, and “all the employees in the strike
left Bahrain after receiving their rights and tickets.”
Migrant worker advocates at times refer cases involving
domestic workers to the Inspections Department. In 2010, the department
received 338 complaints from domestic workers and another 180 in 2011.
While the Inspections Department’s intervention can sometimes help
resolve domestic worker complaints, which involve abuses such as unpaid wages
and poor accommodations, the inspectors have no actual authority to inspect the
private homes in which domestic workers are employed.
Mediation
Migrant workers can file non-criminal labor complaints with
the Ministry of Labor, which initiates a formal mediation process under the
labor law. Domestic workers can also file complaints for contractual
violations—most commonly they do so for late or unpaid wages.
Once a complaint is filed, a ministry mediator sets up a
meeting between the aggrieved worker and his or her employer and attempts to
settle the matter amicably. According to the Ministry of Labor, they are able
convince the parties to reach a settlement in most cases. The Indian embassy
and Indonesian consulate reported that employers were generally willing to
resolve matters once the ministry was involved. However, Human Rights Watch
discovered this was not always true. Several migrant worker advocates and
lawyers found employers unwilling to participate in mediation or come to a
final resolution. “What percent of cases settle we can’t
say,” said an Indian social worker. “Some cases settle at the
ministry, most cases don’t. In most cases [the employer] doesn’t go
there.”[323]
“Half will finish here and half will go to
court,” said Nadia Khalil al-Qaheri, head of the Labor Complaints Section
at the Ministry of Labor.[324]
In 2009, 2010, and 2011 a total of 13,586 workers filed complaints with the
minister of labor for grievances including confiscated passports, unpaid wages,
and failure to receive other benefits or compensation.
Of that number, about 40 percent were foreign workers.[326]
While just under half of all complaints are resolved at the ministry, mediation
is less effective for migrant workers.[327]
In 2009, 2010, and 2011 Ministry of Labor mediators resolved
only 30 percent of complaints filed by foreign workers, forwarding the rest to
labor courts.[328]
When it comes to Bahraini workers, the ministry resolved 56 percent of their
complaints.[329]
In all, the ministry forwarded 2,321 migrant complaints to Bahrain’s
labor courts in 2009, 2010, and 2011, involving a total of 3,869 workers.
“Most of the cases go to courts because the lawyer
wants to go to court or the company is not coming,” said al-Qaheri.
“Maybe 30 or 40 percent of the cases that go to court do so because the
employer doesn’t come.”[331]
Participation in these meetings is effectively voluntary.
Ministry officials give employers two or three opportunities to attend a
mediation meeting before forwarding the complaint to the labor
courts—which, by law, it must do within two weeks after mediation has run
its course. The ministry has no authority to compel an employer’s
participation in mediation or to punish non-participation. If an employer
participates in a mediation meeting, ministry mediators have no power to
enforce labor laws or contracts, impose rulings, or compel settlement. If the
parties cannot reach settlement for whatever reason, the ministry must forward
the case to the labor court.[332]
According to al-Qaheri:
After two [attempts to settle] it finishes, or if we
can’t finish it or sometimes the employer refuses to come, we have to
send it to the court. Because we are the Ministry of Labor, we cannot push
them, we can’t do anything or take any action and after it goes to the
courts then we’re finished. There is nothing we can do.[333]
Lawyers and worker advocates said that they strongly prefer
to settle cases before they reach the courts because the prolonged judicial
process allows employers to defer responsibility, commonly resulting in workers
leaving Bahrain without collecting back wages or other sums owed to them before
the end of trial. Workers often accept meager settlements to avoid long court
battles. “Rarely are these settlements satisfactory,” said Beverley
Hamadeh of the Migrant Workers Protection Society. “Employers will
typically and reluctantly agree to pay some of the salary or the airfare, but
not all the salary.”[334]
Noora Feleyfel, head of the Migrant Workers Protection
Society Action Committee, complained to Human Rights Watch that even when a
settlement is reached, the process still lacks punitive consequences for
employers that could deter future abusive behavior.
Today I as a Bahraini, or anybody, can bring a worker and I
don’t have to pay them for five years if I want. Then someone will bring
a lawsuit against me, or when I go to the Ministry of Labor the ministry might
say, “Listen, you have to pay or we’ll take it further,” and
I say, “‘OK, OK, I’ll pay.” I can just pay the five
years and that’s it. There’s no punishment, not even interest on
what I owe. People need to be punished for not paying the salary. Like a fine
and interest. These employers can basically repeat the same crime and at the
end of the day they can just hire someone else. It’s a cycle.[335]
Labor Courts
For many migrant workers, labor courts are not a viable
source of redress. One reason is that most workers have limited access to
adequate representation. Another is that judicial proceedings are protracted.
In the unusual event that a case actually reaches final judgment in a
courtroom, the ruling usually favors the worker. As one labor lawyer described
it, “Ninety percent of court cases end with successful judgments [for the
workers] which are then executed.”[336] However, labor
trials typically last six to 12 months and are subject to appeal. Few workers
can afford to wait this long without any source of income.
While Bahraini labor law waives all court fees for aggrieved
workers, litigation is still costly for migrant workers who are legally unable
to work without a new work visa.[337]
Frequently, their employers refuse to return their passports or pay their
airfare, which would allow them to return to work in their home countries.
Since employers typically provide migrant workers with housing, domestic
workers are usually forced to live in shelters during the proceedings, while
other workers typically seek help from friends to pay rent.
Understanding the need for speedy labor proceedings,
Bahrain’s 1976 labor law stated, “Legal proceedings [by workers]
shall be dealt with urgently. If an amicable settlement is not reached, the
[Ministry of Labor] shall refer such complaint to the Senior Civil Court,
within a period of two weeks” and “the Clerk of the Court shall,
within a period of three days from the date of receipt of the application by
the Court, fix a date for the hearing.”[338]
In practice, according to one labor lawyer, it typically
takes two or three months once the Ministry of Labor transfers the case to the
labor court before the first hearing.[339] The ministry
claims that it forwards cases to the courts in a timely manner, unless the
aggrieved worker asks to continue with mediation.[340]
Labor courts average around six weeks between each hearing. Cases, which
typically average about six separate hearings, take between six to 12 months,
and longer if appeals are involved.[341]
Pambagal Siradas Rathnaprakash a 39-year-old worker from
Kerala, India, is the main breadwinner for his parents, wife, and two sons
(ages 6 and 11). He arrived in Bahrain in 2006, and worked as plumber until
July 2008 when, after failing to receive wages for four months, he filed a
complaint with the Ministry of Labor. After his sponsor did not attend three
mediation meetings, his case went to court. “I went to the lawyer and I
told her, I don’t want that much money. I just want my passport and a bit
of money—my expenses.”[342]
Rathnaprakash attended court hearings on October 10, 2008;
November 11, 2008; and January 19, 2009. On February 4, 2009,
Rathnaprakash’s employer filed a countersuit, alleging he was a runaway.
“But because I made my complaint [first] they did not send me to the jail
for runaways,” he said.[343]
Rathnaprakash stayed with friends between July 2008, when he
filed his case, and February 2010, when he spoke with Human Rights Watch,
working odd jobs in the meantime. “When I managed to get some money, I
sent it home. When I didn’t, I couldn’t,” he said.[344]
His sponsor’s refusal to release him from his work visa and decision to
file an absconding claim against him meant that Rathnaprakash (who goes by the
name Prakash) could not legally get a job or leave the country.
My mother is sick, but my boss said, “I will not let
you go back to your country—you give me 500 dinars [$1328] [to release
you]. Prakash it’s so easy to go to India—you are in Bahrain, I
will decide when I send you and when you come back.” The problem is I
cannot change my work [without a release] and I cannot return home. What am I
supposed to do?[345]
In late 2009, after several more court hearings, Rathnaprakash
received a favorable verdict awarding him his back wages, airfare, passport, and
additional damages. However, his employer appealed the ruling and Rathnaprakash
had to file another suit to enforce the court award.[346]
My friend told me, if you want to go home quickly, go to
the ministry. Now it’s four years since I’ve been here. My boss
said, “If I give you money for a ticket, and the other laborers know that
Prakash got some money and went back home, then they will all want the
same.”[347]
In June 2010, Rathnaprakash lost on appeal and was ordered
to pay his former employer BD200 ($530) to cover his legal expenses.[348]
Such a wait is untenable for many migrant workers. Human
Rights Watch spoke with two domestic workers and three construction workers who
remained without income in Bahrain for between four and six months while they
waited for a verdict. All these workers expressed a pressing need to return
home. Marietta Dias from the Migrant Workers Protection Society said, “We
try to stop the cases from even going to labor court. The workers can’t
endure six to 12 months with no pay. They have to eat.”[349]
Faced with long trials, workers are often willing to accept
unfavorable settlements. “The cases will drag, drag, drag, and the
employee gets fed up,” said one social worker.[350]
Migrant worker advocates and lawyers told Human Rights Watch that abusive
employers, exploiting the desperation of aggrieved
workers, persuade them to settle for small amounts of back pay and plane
tickets, or for as little as returning the passport and releasing the visa.
Sometimes employers make settlement offers in bad faith.
“If an official complaint has been lodged they persuade the employee to
withdraw the complaint on the promise of settling but then fail to uphold their
promises once the complaint has been withdrawn,” said Beverly Hamadeh.[351]
One method described to Human Rights Watch was when an employer promises back
wages and plane tickets, but asks to finalize matters at the airport. There, he
asks the worker “to sign papers saying [his or her employer] has given him
or her BD300 while traveling [to the airport] but then [at the airport] he
gives only 100, 150 dinars and sends [the worker] away.”[352]
The labor case against the Muhammad Ali al-Asfoor Company
started in October 2009 with 42 plaintiffs. In February 2010, when Human Rights
Watch spoke with some workers and their lawyer, only three of the 42 men were
still in the country and the court had held only one initial hearing. Their
lawyer explained:
The problem is that things should work and [the government]
tries to make it work but the system is very slow and for such issues you
can’t be that slow. For example, for our case, the 42 workers, once we
put everything in place with the labor court and with the public prosecutor for
the human trafficking case, we are just going through the paperwork between the
police station and the public prosecutor.[353]
By the time the prosecutor takes up the case, the lawyer
added, “We can’t find them, they are not here [in Bahrain].”
These workers were compelled to leave Bahrain in part owing to their difficult
financial circumstances, she and her colleague said. “By that time the
employer … asks them to sign a paper they can’t read.”
Bahraini regulations require that before a migrant worker can leave the
country, an employer must present documentation signed by the worker that
indicates he or she has been paid all their wages and benefits.[355]
According to worker advocates, abusive employers often
induce migrant workers to sign such documents without providing their full
benefits, either through fraud, intimidation, or playing on a worker’s
desperation to return home and start earning again.
In some cases, aggrieved workers manage to pay their airfare themselves
or with assistance from a community organization. If these workers have pending
labor cases, they can grant power of attorney to their lawyers or embassies and
return home—assuming the employer has not filed a criminal counter claim
and issues regarding visa releases and passports can be resolved. Once granted
power of attorney, a migrant worker’s lawyer or embassy can proceed with
the matter as a representative of the worker. Granting power of attorney and
sorting out other immigration, passport, and work visa issues can still take
weeks or months, but many workers prefer this option to staying in Bahrain.
However, at the end of the trial, embassies or lawyers often have trouble
finding low-income workers and those who live in remote areas of their home
countries.[357]
In effect, workers who leave before the end of trial risk not receiving any
potential court-ordered award.
Sheikh Khalid bin Ali Al Khalifa, the minister of justice,
told Human Rights Watch in 2010 that the planned case management system, now in
the 2012 labor law, would streamline proceedings.
We are trying to include case management in the new labor
law. Why? There are three things to look at if you want to evaluate any
judicial system in terms of efficiency. How long? How much? And how many
procedures? We are trying to decrease these three. For how much, there is no
problem, [since workers] don’t pay anything in most of the cases. How
long, this will be affected by [case management reforms]. We are trying to
minimize it, trying to make it very fast. Two months will be the maximum
period. This will be favorable to the labor and helpful for us as well as we
don’t want to have a pending case for a long time and the laborer remains
in the country. The solution is to prepare the case very quickly and give it to
a judge to expedite the proceedings.[358]
Criminal Laws Punishing
Abuse of Migrant Workers
The Bahrain Penal Code of 1976 and subsequent amendments
sets out criminal offences and punishments. With regard to issues pertaining to
migrant workers, the penal code’s most important provision is article
302, which states:
A punishment of imprisonment or a fine, or either penalty,
shall be imposed upon every person who employs forced labor to undertake any
work or unjustifiably withholds all or some or their wages.[359]
The penal code also defines and sets punishment for physical
assault, sexual assault, manslaughter, and rape.[360]
More recently, Law No. 1 (2008), With Respect to Trafficking
in Persons, makes human trafficking a criminal offense and mandates that a task
force be assembled to monitor and set policies for combating human trafficking.[361]
As defined by the law, human trafficking is:
The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring, or
receipt of a person for the purpose of abuse by means of threat or use by force
or other forms of coercion, deception, of the abuse of power or of a position
or abuse of authority by a person having control over another person or any
other illegal means whether directly or indirectly for the purpose of
exploitation.[362]
Exploitation includes “forced labor or services,
slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude.”[363]
Abd al-Wahab Rashid, head of anti-trafficking for the
Ministry of Interior, told Human Rights Watch in February 2010 that while the
state’s initial anti-human trafficking focus is primarily on trafficking
into forced prostitution, it is now looking at the practice of withholding
salaries, confiscating passports, and/or dubious recruitment practices as
rising to the level human trafficking.[364] Yet in June 2010,
Attorney General Al Buainian told Human Rights Watch that his office had yet to
fully consider whether exploitative practices involving unpaid wages, coupled
with passport confiscation, rise to the level of human trafficking.[365]
Even government officials from the same ministries had differing opinions as to
whether passport confiscation was a crime in Bahrain or simply a civil
violation. In a letter sent to the government of Bahrain on September 8, 2010,
Human Rights Watch asked for the source of law that outlawed passport
confiscation. In response, government officials said that passport confiscation
constitutes criminal violations under Penal Code article 389 and the anti-human
trafficking law.
Prosecution of Abuses against Migrant Workers
Bahrain’s Public Prosecution Office, which
investigates and prosecutes crimes under the penal code, has primarily pursued only
migrant labor cases that involve physical and sexual abuse. The 2008 anti-trafficking
law includes provisions that criminalize forced labor and some exploitative
recruitment, providing the Public Prosecution Office with measures that Bahraini
authorities can use to protect migrant workers. However, Bahrain’s overall
record of criminal prosecution for labor related offenses is mixed. Human Rights
Watch was not able to confirm a single case of criminal prosecution by the
Public Prosecution Office under the penal code or anti-trafficking law for
labor-related abuses such as withheld wages, passport confiscation, and forced
labor. The US State Department similarly found no evidence “that the
government adequately investigated or punished trafficking cases involving
forced labor despite common reports of domestic workers facing serious
conditions indicative of forced labor.”
The Public Prosecution Office has investigated and
prosecuted some cases of physical and sexual abuse, and courts have found some
alleged perpetrators guilty. For example, in December 2010 a Lower Criminal
Court sentenced a sponsor’s wife to one month in prison and a fine for
the bruising physical assault of her domestic worker, Salma Begum, a
32-year-old widow from India. Migrant
worker advocates stress, however, that convictions in physical and sexual abuse
cases are rare and judges sometimes display pro-employer biases.
Migrant worker advocates complain that criminal
investigations and prosecutions are frequently dropped as government police and
prosecutors fail to pursue complaints expeditiously or effectively. Long delays
typically force workers alleging abuse to either remain in Bahrain without a
salary or to leave the country before appearing in court. Cases are dropped at
various stages, from investigation to formal charges to hearings, without
reaching a courtroom. In some cases, perpetrators are never charged.
A Migrant Workers Protection Society volunteer told Human
Rights Watch that in February 2010, the group escorted one client, Sethy Begum,
a domestic worker from Sri Lanka, to the police station and the Public
Prosecution Office to file charges against her employer for raping her at
knifepoint the previous month.[370]
Six months later, in August 2010, authorities had not yet assigned a date for
the first hearing. Begum returned to Sri Lanka in September 2010.[371]
The volunteer from the Migrant Workers Protection Society later learned the
authorities dropped the investigation.
In another case widely covered by Bahraini media, Lakshmi
Surampudi, an Indian woman employed as a domestic worker, reported years of
being “regularly hit, kicked, stomped on, poked in the eye with a key,
and dragged by her hair or ears by her sponsor’s ex-wife.”[373]
She said she was also deprived of food and not paid for three-and-a-half years.[374]
Surampudi filed charges with the police in July 2009, but no charges were filed
against her alleged abuser. After waiting five months for her case to progress,
Surampudi decided to return to India. Noora Feleyfel told Human Rights Watch:
I represent the Migrant Workers Protection Society on the
National Committee to Combat Trafficking in Persons, where I have brought up
the Lakshmi case, because nothing had happened for six to eight months and no
trial date was given to me. Everyone was concerned and there appeared to be
some movement, but then nothing. Now it’s been a year and no charges.
The Ministry of Interior and police station both contacted
me numerous times to get more information. So clearly there was some effort on
their part to investigate.
They needed her to come in to have the medical
commissioners examine her, which wasn’t initially requested when she was
here. Now after it was brought up in the committee, they are asking to examine
her again. I have informed them at least on five different occasions that
Lakshmi left the country in December. Apparently they claim what is pending for
the trial is the medical commissioner’s report and that they don’t
have proof that she left the country. This is CID [Criminal Investigations
Directorate] that is saying this. I think they are more competent than that,
but are not using their full resources because they don’t believe it is
important or worthy.[375]
Feleyfel said that cases like that of Surampudi demonstrate
a lack of accountability for employers who abuse migrant workers.
For us, this was a test case. We chose to push it, because
it covered the full spectrum of issues that we see with most of our cases:
physical abuse, verbal abuse, very long hours of work, not being paid salary,
not being paid the agreed salary rate, not being allowed to contact her family,
being fed very, very little. We also had a good relationship with the local
police station [where the complaint was filed]. It was in the newspapers. The
evidence was clear; Lakshmi was covered in marks. It seems employers can get
away with anything in Bahrain. After a while, Lakshmi just wanted to return
home, so we got her a plane ticket in December [2009] and she’s back in
India.[376]
In June 2010 the Bahraini government told Human Rights Watch
that Surampudi’s case remained with the Public Prosecution Office in the
investigatory stages. In January 2011, Feleyfel informed Human Rights Watch
that authorities had dropped the investigation, largely because of a lack of
evidence stemming in part from the fact that investigators waited six months
before ordering a physical exam of Surampudi.By that time Surampudi was no longer in the
country.“What was she to do, wait years until
the case was dealt with?” Feleyfel asked.
Attorney Maha Jaber, who represents the Muhammad Ali
al-Asfoor company workers, told Human Rights Watch that she filed a human
trafficking complaint on her clients’ behalf in January 2010, but three
months later the investigation had barely gotten off the ground.
I think such an important claim should not be sent to the
police station for investigation. The police station is so busy they cannot
even classify the case. This should be taken up directly by the Public
Prosecutor.
I never thought such an important claim, like ours, one
that was written up in the newspaper, would not have been investigated by the
Public Prosecutor himself.
This is not intentional. It’s pure bureaucracy.
[Attorney General] Ali Al Buainain is part of the solution. He specifically
mentions we should bring him these [worker] claims. The Public Prosecution can
fast track it.[380]
Without income, several of Maha Jaber’s clients left
the country before any criminal investigation or trial took place.
For any criminal claim, I have to have the workers around
because for criminal claims, sometimes they are needed for the investigation.
They have to testify to their side of the story and if they are not around, I
can’t cover the whole thing. It’s usually better [for the judge] to
hear it from them and not their lawyers. But by the time everything is ready
[for trial], they’re not here.[381]
While cases involving physical and sexual abuse, or filed as
human trafficking, may move slowly or not at all through criminal courts, cases
involving unpaid wages—the most common worker complaint are even less
likely to progress. The Public Prosecution Office told Human Rights Watch in
February 2010 that it had not conducted a single prosecution despite penal code
provisions specifically criminalizing the “unjust withholding of
wages.”[382]
Prosecutors claim this is because they have never received such a complaint
from the Ministry of the Interior. “A lot of lawyers go straight to civil
court, but I think it is very important to have these cases here,” said
Attorney General Al Buainain.[383]
Officials in the Ministry of Interior and Ministry of Labor
appeared to be unaware of the penal code provision criminalizing wage
withholding, which they saw as a purely civil matter. Interior Ministry
officials told Human Rights Watch that they instruct workers to seek unpaid
wages at the Ministry of Labor.[384]
The Ministry of Labor does not refer nonpayment claims to the Public
Prosecutor. In February 2010, Human Rights Watch raised this concern with the
Public Prosecutor. In March, Attorney General Al Buainain issued a decree
mandating that the Office of the Public Prosecution conduct criminal
investigations and prosecutions under the penal code for violations involving
unpaid wages and forced labor.[385]
In April 2010 he issued a letter to the Ministry of Labor requesting it forward
his office unpaid wages complaints. In June 2010, he sent a letter to the
Ministry of Interior highlighting the criminality of salary non-payment and the
police’s obligation to forward such cases. To Human Rights Watch’s
knowledge, as of May 2012 there had been no prosecutions of employers for
withholding wages.
Government Pledges
On December 10, 2010, UN Human Rights Day, the government
released a document detailing its efforts and commitments to protect the rights
of migrant workers in the country.
The document, produced in cooperation with the United Nations Development
Program as part of Bahrain’s 2008 Universal Periodic Review by the UN
Human Rights Council, includes pledges designed to improve Bahrain’s
response to many abuses migrant workers face. These pledges resulted partly
from exchanges and meetings between the government and Human Rights Watch in
which Human Rights Watch presented and discussed the findings and recommendations
contained in this report.
The government’s pledges reflect several of Human
Rights Watch’s recommendations, including a special inspections campaign
targeting employers who withhold wages and passports, incorporating the case
management system in the draft labor law, increasing inspections and
inspectors, increasing the number of qualified translators available to workers
at government agencies, publicizing the fact that withholding passports or
wages is a criminal offense, raising workers’ awareness of their rights
and remedies, and prompting investigations and prosecutions when warranted of
labor-related violations of the penal code. The government said it would
consider three further steps: ratifying a new ILO convention on domestic work,
which Bahrain voted for in June 2011; working with embassies and the Bahraini
bar association to provide migrant workers with pro bono legal services; and
providing counseling to victims of abuse. At a
press conference introducing the government’s pledges, then–Minister
of State for Foreign Affairs Nazar Al Baharna announced an inspections campaign
aimed at reining in rogue sponsors who withhold wages and confiscate passports,
saying:
Several government agencies will co-ordinate in the drive
that could involve inspectors visiting organizations and talking to employees
and employers.… Bahrain’s law is clear on the subject. Any employer
who withholds the passport is indulging in human trafficking, which is a crime.
We will not let this happen.… At the same time, we request workers to
report any passport confiscation immediately for the agencies involved to take
action. We cannot do it alone and need everybody to cooperate.
Many of the pledges included in the government/UNDP
document, if properly implemented, would improve the status of migrant workers
in Bahrain. However, the government did not commit to several other Human
Rights Watch recommendations, including expanding all basic worker protections
to migrant domestic workers, adopting a minimum wage for the private sector,
and requiring that Bahraini companies exercise due diligence in screening the
recruitment agencies they partner with in labor-sending countries.
In December 2011, Human Rights Watch wrote Bahraini
authorities requesting an update on the implementation of these pledges. The
government did not provide this information in its May 2012 response to Human
Rights Watch. Human Rights Watch was able gather some information about implementation
of the pledges through worker advocates, Bahraini media, and other sources.
Human Rights Watch had recommended that the government
significantly increase the number of inspectors responsible for overseeing
private sector labor, health, and safety practices, and the government had
pledged to increase the number of Ministry of Labor inspectors by 50 percent.
As noted, the ministry increased the number of health and safety inspectors, tasked
with monitoring compliance with safety regulations, dramatically, from six in
2010 to 30 in 2011. In the
view of migrant worker advocates in Bahrain, however, this figure remained inadequate
for carrying out worksite and accommodation inspections, especially given the Department
of Inspections own recognition of its needs. In
2010 the department employed 27 labor inspectors, who oversee compliance with
labor laws, but Human Rights Watch has not been able to determine whether the
Ministry of Labor has increased the number of these inspectors. As noted, Ahmed
Alhaiki, head of inspections for the ministry, told Human Rights Watch that he
would need 100 inspectors to achieve his goal of inspecting every company once
a year.[392]
The government also pledged to launch an inspections
campaign aimed at “exposing employers that withhold wages and confiscate passports
and penalizing violators.”
However, in February 2012 Migrant Workers Protection Society representatives told
Human Rights Watch that the government had not instigated such a campaign, saying
that “the onus is on the worker to report complaints to the Ministry of
Labor regarding wages, and to the police regarding passports.”
The government also pledged to initiate a campaign to inform
workers that withholding wages and confiscating passports are crimes under the
anti-trafficking law, to penalize employers that partake in these practices,
and to act on complaints by workers who alleged they had experienced these
abuses. In 2011, however, Bahraini authorities took no action to prosecute
these and other common labor-related crimes, other than physical and sexual
abuse and sex-trafficking.
As noted, the government pledged to “consider the
adoption of the … ILO Convention on the treatment of domestic
workers.” In
June 2011, Bahrain, alongside the rest of the GCC countries, voted to create
the convention, reversing its earlier opposition.
As of this writing Bahrain has yet to ratify the convention, the necessary step
to make it binding on the government.
Migrant workers in Bahrain not only experience abuses within
the context of the employee-employer relationship but also face discrimination
and other abuses from society in general. Since 2008, Human Rights Watch has
received reports of occasional assaults on South Asian migrant workers by persons
who were not the workers’ employers. In mid-March 2011, as tensions between
the government and pro-democracy protesters intensified, these attacks
escalated drastically.
Human Rights Watch documented several attacks against South
Asian migrant workers in and around Manama on March 13, 2011, immediately
before security forces launched a violent crackdown on anti-government protests.
Human Rights Watch spoke with 12 migrant workers, all of them nationals of
Pakistan and Bangladesh, who said that on March 13 and 14 gangs of masked men
armed with sticks, knives, and other weapons harassed and attacked them at
their places of residence. Most said the attackers were specifically looking
for Pakistanis. Several said they believed their attackers were anti-government
protesters, although they could not provide any information to support those
perceptions. All of the men interviewed said they could not positively identify
their attackers because they had covered their faces with their shirts or
masks.
On March 23, 2011 Human Rights Watch visited the Pakistan
Club, a private Manama-based organization providing services to migrant and
expatriate Pakistanis living in Bahrain. Daoud, a Pakistani migrant worker in
his mid-20s, told Human Rights Watch that on March 14 the private club opened
its doors to Pakistani migrant workers who had been attacked or feared
persecution.[398]
He explained that the migrant workers initially sought refuge at the Pakistani
embassy in Manama, but the embassy sent them to the Pakistan Club and a school
in Isa Town because the embassy lacked space. Daoud said approximately 250
migrant workers, most of them Pakistani nationals, sought refuge at the club.
He added that at least 15 had been injured, some seriously, and that many had
lost contact with their employers and wanted to go back to Pakistan because of
the precarious security situation.
Abdul M., a Bangladeshi laborer, told Human Rights Watch that
on the afternoon of March 13 between 20 and 30 Arab men armed with sticks and
knives attacked him and his friends. He and
his friends were able to escape with only minor injuries. He said that the next
day, around 8 or 8:30 p.m., he and his friends encountered a group of about
70-80 anti-government protesters on Sheikh Abdullah Road in Manama. Abdul M.
said about a dozen of this group attacked him and his friends with sticks and
knives. He said they beat him and that his wounds required seven stitches.
Other migrant workers interviewed by Human Rights Watch
described attacks by gangs of Arab men in or around their homes. Shehbaz, a
Bangladeshi migrant worker who had sought refuge at the Pakistan Club, told
Human Rights Watch that on the evening of March 13 he was out buying cigarettes
around 9:30 p.m. when a group of around 30 Arab men spotted him and chased him
into his building, which he said was primarily occupied by Bangladeshis.[400]
He said they asked him to show them his CPR card but he refused and ran into
his apartment and locked the door behind him.
The attackers broke down the door to his apartment and began beating him and
two others with knives, hammers, and steel rods. Shehbaz said his friends
managed to escape, but he could not. He said when they were beating him the
men, all of whom wore masks, accused him of “getting money from the king
of Bahrain” and told him to “leave their country.” He said
after his attackers left he called for an ambulance but none came. He went to
the hospital for medical treatment the next day. He showed Human Rights Watch
scars to his left leg and right arm that he said were caused by knives and
sticks the men carried.
Babar, a Pakistani migrant worker, told Human Rights Watch
that on March 13, around 11 p.m., 15 masked men – he referred to them as
Arabs but did not say how he knew this – gathered in front of their
building in Manama and called on the Pakistanis to come out.[402]
He said several of them accused the Pakistanis of taking government jobs. When
the residents did not heed the attackers’ calls, they entered the
building. He and several others escaped to the roof, followed by four of the
attackers. Babar said the attackers caught up with him and his friends on the
roof and demanded their CPRs, which they refused to hand over. The attackers then
ordered him and his friend to go back down to their apartment. On the way down,
Babar said, the men attacked him and the others with bats, steel rods, and knives,
and yelled “Go back to Pakistan!” One of the attackers struck him on
his head and arm with a steel rod. Babar said the attack lasted about 10 to 15
minutes. He sustained serious injuries to his arm and went to the BDF hospital
for treatment, he said.
Another laborer, a Pakistani man who did not want to be
identified, said that on March 13, around 7:30 p.m., a group of eight to 10
Arab men forced their way into the building where he was living and checked the
CPRs of residents.[403]
He told Human Rights Watch that the men, who he said carried swords, rods, and hammers,
separated the Pakistanis from the others and began beating them. The man said
one of the attackers had a gas cylinder and set fire to the mattress in their
apartment. He said that he and several of his friends sustained lacerations
from injuries caused by swords the attackers wielded.
Mohammed E, a Pakistani laborer, said that around 7 p.m. on
March 13, 14 men gathered outside of a building where he and dozens of other
South Asian laborers resided.[404]
He said the men shouted profanities and ordered the Pakistanis to come out of
the building. When the residents refused the men entered the building. He and
one of his flat mates ran to the roof of the building while others stayed in
their apartments and locked the doors. Mohammed told Human Rights Watch that as
he was running up to the roof he could hear the men breaking down doors. When
he reached the roof, Mohammed said, he looked down and saw a group of 15 men –
Arabs, he said – beating one of his friends, Abdul Malik, in front of
their building. Around the same time several of the attackers, all of whom had
covered their faces with masks or their shirts, cornered him and his friend on
the roof. Mohamed said they were carrying knives, sticks, and hammers. One of
them looked at him and said: “You and your Pakistanis come here and work
in the security forces. We will kill all Pakistanis! Go back to being a
laborer!” He said the men then attacked him and hit him on the head with
a blunt object, causing him to pass out.
Mohammed said when he regained consciousness on the roof he
looked down to the street and saw that Abdul Malik was not moving. He and the
others went down to him and realized he was dead. They called for an ambulance
but none arrived and the body lay on the street for several hours. Mohammed
told Human Rights Watch that the mob singled out Pakistanis because they were
wearing shalwar kameez, traditional clothes generally worn by Pakistani
and Bangladeshi migrant workers. Mohammed told Human Rights Watch that
the attack left 11 men injured, seven of them seriously, and one – Abdul
Malik – dead.
Human Rights Watch interviewed several other Pakistani and
Bangladeshi migrant workers who said they were too afraid to leave their homes
between March 13 and March 16 because of violence associated with the
government crackdown against protesters, but they were not actually attacked.
According to the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry
(BICI), which documented rights abuses during the government crackdown on anti-government
protests, Abdul Malik (whose full name was Ghulam Rasool) was pronounced dead
on March 13.[405]
Abdul Malik’s death certificate states that the cause of death was a
“severe chest contusion leading to cardiac laceration, caused by cardiac
tamponade, which resulted in acute heart failure.”[406]
According to the BICI, a forensic report said “the deceased sustained
cuts and bruises to his shoulder, hand, left knee, left leg, right eye, back
and head.”[407]
The BICI report said that a criminal investigation conducted by the Ministry of
Interior concluded that Abdul Malik was beaten to death by a mob in front of a
building in the neighborhood of Naim.[408] Authorities charged
15 defendants for their alleged involvement in the murder of Abdul Malik; on
October 3, 2010 a special military court convicted 14 and acquitted one.[409]
According to the BICI report, Bahrain’s Ministry of
Interior concluded that four migrant workers had been killed as a result of
incidents related to the unrest and another 88 were injured, including 11
Indians, 18 Bangladeshi, 58 Pakistanis, and 1 Filipino.[410] Of
the four deaths “two [including the death of Abdul Malik] are
attributable to civilians and are categorized as intentional killings.”[411]
The second death attributed to gang violence was that of Farid Maqbul, a
Bangladeshi national who was pronounced dead on March 19.[412]
The report concluded that Maqbul’s killing was intentional but
“attributable to unknown perpetrators.”[413]
The cause of death was “multiple trauma injuries to the head and
face.”[414]
Two other migrant workers, Stephan Abraham, an Indian
national, and Ikhlas Tozzumul Ali, a Bangladeshi national, died during clashes
between security and military personnel and demonstrators and not as a result
of armed gangs. The BICI report corroborated Human Rights Watch’s earlier
conclusions that Abraham died as a result of a stray bullet probably fired by
the BDF, and that Ikhlas (or Eklas) died as a result of a being hit by a
vehicle in Sitra.[415]
To Human Rights Watch’s knowledge, no one has been prosecuted in
connection with the deaths of Maqbul, Abraham or, Ikhlas.
The BICI report noted that “most [migrant worker] complaints
received by the Commission pertained to physical injuries, property damage,
economic loss, deprivation of the freedom of movement, denial of medical
treatment, and attacks at places of worship.”[416]
Since Human Rights Watch conducted its investigation
into these attacks, some local groups have claimed that they documented more
than 200 attacks on South Asian migrant workers since February 14, 2011.
Human Rights Watch has not been able to independently verify these figures.
A comprehensive body of international law protecting
workers’ rights has emerged over the past 50 years. Where a state has
accepted to be bound by these standards, they apply to all workers in the
country, both foreign workers and citizens. In most cases, a government’s
obligation is to ensure that employers respect the rights of workers by law,
regulation, investigation, and prosecution, as appropriate.
ILO Conventions
Bahrain is a member of the International Labour Organization
(ILO) and has ratified four core ILO conventions: two relating to the
elimination of forced and compulsory labor, the convention on the elimination
of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation, and the convention
on abolition of child labor. Bahrain has also ratified ILO Convention No. 14 on
weekly rest of industry workers, Convention No. 81 on labor inspection,
Convention No. 89 on industrial night work of women, Convention No. 155 on
occupational health and safety, and Convention No.159 on vocational
rehabilitation and employment of disabled persons.
Bahrain has not ratified two other core ILO conventions, No.
87 on freedom of association and protection of the right to organize, and No.
98 on the right to organize and collective bargaining.
In its 1998 Declaration of Fundamental Principles and Rights
at Work, the ILO emphasized that all member states must implement and respect
fundamental workers’ rights within the ILO framework.[418]
The declaration states that all members are obligated to allow freedom of
association and the right to collective bargaining.[419]
As of late August 2012, Bahrain had yet to ratify Convention
No. 189 on decent work for domestic workers despite having pledged to consider doing
so and having voted for the convention’s creation.
Human Rights Treaty
Obligations
Bahrain has ratified the International Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD), the International
Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), the Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the
Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or
Punishment (CAT), the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in
Persons, and the Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and
Air (the Palermo protocols). Together these treaties contain provisions that obligate
Bahrain to protect workers against most labor-related abuses.
Fair and Safe Work
Conditions
The ICESCR recognizes “the right of everyone to the
enjoyment of just and favorable conditions of work.”[421]
Such conditions must ensure:
Remuneration which provides
all workers, as a minimum, with:
Fair wages and equal remuneration for work of equal value
without distinction of any kind in particular women being guaranteed
conditions of work not inferior to those enjoyed by men, with equal pay
for equal work; A decent living for
themselves and their families in accordance with the provisions of the
present Covenant;
Safe and healthy working
conditions;
Equal opportunity for everyone
to be promoted …;
Rest, leisure and reasonable limitation of working hours
and periodic holidays with pay, as well as remuneration for public
holidays.[422]
Regarding non-citizens’ rights concerning work, the Committee on the
Elimination of Racial Discrimination’s General Recommendation No. 30
states that once an employment relationship has been initiated, and until
it is terminated, all individuals, even those without work permits, are
entitled to the enjoyment of labor and employment rights.[423]
Freedom of Movement
ICCPR article 12 establishes an individual’s right to
freedom of movement stating:
Everyone lawfully
within the territory of a State shall, within that territory, have the
right to liberty of movement and freedom to choose his residence.
Everyone shall be
free to leave any country, including his own.
The above-mentioned
rights shall not be subject to any restrictions except those provided by
law, are necessary to protect national security, public order (ordre
public), public health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others, and
are consistent with the other rights recognized in the present Covenant.
No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of the right
to enter his own country.[424]
HRC General Comment No. 15 stresses that article 12 applies
to aliens “lawfully within a territory,” and adds that
“differences in treatment in this regard between aliens and nationals, or
between different categories of aliens, need to be justified under article 12,
paragraph 3.”
General Comment No. 27 explains that all restrictions on freedom of movement,
in addition to being in accordance with paragraph 3, must also be the
appropriate, least intrusive instrument for achieving a necessary and
permissible purpose. Restrictions must also conform to the principle of
proportionality.
Physical and Sexual Abuse
The ICCPR provides for security of person and, along with
the CAT, the right to be free from cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.[427]
According to the UN Human Rights Committee, article 7 of the ICCPR requires
“public authorities to ensure protection by the law against [cruel,
inhuman and degrading] treatment even when committed by persons acting outside
or without any official authority.”[428] The HRC also
determined that states have a responsibility to “prevent, punish,
investigate or redress the harm caused by such acts by private persons or
entities.”[429]
The Committee Against Torture, the expert body that reviews state compliance
with the CAT, explained that article 2 of the convention obligates states to
“exercise due diligence to prevent, investigate, prosecute and
punish” acts of ill-treatment by private actors.[430]
In the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women, in 1993, the
UN General Assembly stated that governments are obliged to “prevent,
investigate, and in accordance with national legislation, punish acts of
violence against women, whether these acts are perpetrated by states or by
private persons.”[431]
A state’s consistent failure to do so amounts to unequal and
discriminatory treatment, and constitutes a violation of the state’s
obligation under CEDAW to guarantee women equal protection of the law.
Judicial Redress
In its General Comment No. 32, the UN Human Rights Committee
declared that article 14 of the ICCPR means that “delays in civil
proceedings that cannot be justified by the complexity of the case or the
behaviour of the parties detract from the principle of a fair hearing,”
and “where such delays are caused by a lack of resources and chronic
under-funding, to the extent possible supplementary budgetary resources should
be allocated for the administration of justice.”[432]
Furthermore, according to the committee, article 14
“encompasses the right of access to the courts,” and states that:
[a]ccess to administration of
justice must effectively be guaranteed in all such cases to ensure that no
individual is deprived, in procedural terms, of his/her right to claim justice.
The right of access to courts and tribunals and equality before them is not
limited to citizens of States parties, but must also be available to all
individuals, regardless of nationality or statelessness, or whatever their
status, [including] migrant workers…. A situation in which an individual’s
attempts to access the competent courts or tribunals are systematically
frustrated de jure or de facto runs counter to the guarantees of article 14.[433]
Business and Human Rights Responsibilities
Although the government of Bahrain has the primary
responsibility to respect, protect, and fulfill human rights under
international law, private companies also have responsibilities regarding human
rights.
The longstanding concept that businesses have human rights
responsibilities, reflected for example in the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights in relation to the responsibilities of “every organ of
society”, has gained additional support and further articulation as a
result of work during the tenure of a UN Special Representative on Business and
Human Rights from 2005 to 2011. In 2008, the UN Human Rights Council endorsed
the “Protect, Respect and Remedy” framework, which explicitly
recognized a corporate responsibility to respect all human rights, and in 2011
it approved the “Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights,”
which offered guidelines specifying some of the steps businesses should follow
in order to implement their responsibilities. As laid out in those documents,
businesses should respect all human rights, avoid complicity in abuses, and
adequately remedy them if they occur.
In particular, the Guiding Principles call upon businesses
to undertake adequate due diligence that encompasses risk assessments and
monitoring, in order to identify and prevent human rights violations, including
forced labor and human trafficking. More
generally, companies should have policies and procedures in place to ensure
that human rights are respected and not abused, to undertake adequate due
diligence to identify and effectively mitigate human rights problems, and to
adequately respond in cases where problems arise.
Human Rights Watch believes that states should impose clear
requirements on companies to ensure that they uphold their responsibility to
respect human rights in the state’s jurisdiction, and that a remedy is
provided in cases where abuses nonetheless occur. Even in the absence of
nationally mandated requirements, however, all businesses should carry out
human rights due diligence and address prospective human rights abuses.
To the Government of Bahrain
Ensure speedy and full investigation and prosecution of employers
and recruiters who violate provisions of Bahrain’s criminal laws and
impose meaningful penalties on employers found to have violated the law. The
government should:
Ensure that police investigators and prosecutors are adequately
staffed and trained to investigate and prosecute these violations of the law.Ensure that prosecutors conduct investigations and prosecutions
in a timely manner, with special attention to the obstacles migrant workers
face staying in Bahrain for the duration of investigation and trial.Disseminate widely a clear statement, issued by a competent legal
authority, illustrating examples of specific labor practices that violate Law
No.1 of 2008, With Respect to Trafficking in Persons. This statement should
include as examples of elements of trafficking withholding of wages, charging
recruitment fees, and confiscating passports.Ensure the prosecution of employers under penal code provisions that
prohibit withholding wages and passports.Create mechanisms for the automatic referral of cases from the
Ministry of Labor, the Labor Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), and the
General Directorate of Nationality, Residency, and Passports at the Ministry of
Interior to the Office of the Public Prosecution so that prosecutors can
identify potential criminal violations within labor disputes and passport
matters. Prosecutors should investigate and prosecute violations of the human
trafficking law or penal code.Improve Ministry of Labor mediation and labor courts to ensure
effective and timely resolution of labor disputes for migrant workers,
including domestic workers. Impose meaningful administrative and civil
penalties on employers who violate the law and regulations.Advise workers at the time they file complaints with the Ministry
of Labor of their right to seek representation for mediation meetings from
their embassies, a lawyer, or an NGO advocating for migrant workers. Ensure
that workers can easily assign power of attorney to a representative of their
choice, including by providing workers with a power of attorney form and the
services of a notary public at the Ministry of Labor.Ensure that the Ministry of Labor transfers labor complaints to the
Office for the Administration of Labor Suits (OALS) or labor courts within two
weeks of receiving them unless both parties agree to continue mediation. Ensure
that any requirement that workers re-file cases with the OALS does not create
additional barriers to redress.Ensure that trials commence shortly after disputes reach the OALS
and the labor courts.Announce the expedited application of the case management
mechanism outlined in chapter 13 of the new private sector labor law in order
to ensure that labor disputes proceed in an expedited manner. I
Hire an adequate number of OALS judges to ensure that all labor
disputes are resolved within two months.
The Ministry of Labor, the LMRA, and the Ministry of Justice and
Islamic Affairs should recruit sufficient numbers of qualified interpreters so
that foreign workers can understand, in their own language, all procedures,
orders, and timelines associated with their complaints and civil trials, before
and during referral of their claims to court.
If labor dispute continue to trial, refer workers without legal
representation to resources that can help them secure such representation. Work
with NGOs, foreign embassies, private law firms, and the Bahraini Bar
Association to ensure that indigent migrant workers have access to pro bono
legal services. Consider also making lawyers available to indigent workers at
government expense.
Reach agreements with sending-country embassies that enable
workers to give their embassies powers of attorney if they must or choose to
leave Bahrain before labor dispute proceedings are complete. Authorize
embassies to collect court awards on their nationals’ behalf.
Provide workers who allege that abuses forced them to leave
employment, and have duly filed complaints with the Ministry of Labor, with
information on unemployment benefits and how to attain new employment.
Instruct the Ministry of Labor and the Ministry of Justice and
Islamic Affairs to collect and publish yearly statistics regarding the number
and type of complaints filed with the Ministry of Labor and with labor courts
under the jurisdiction the Minister of Justice and Islamic Affairs, including
how these complaints are resolved and the duration of the legal proceedings.
Improve the ability of inspectors to address violations of
the labor law and health and safety regulations.
Continue to increase the number of inspectors responsible for
overseeing private sector labor and health and safety practices so that there
are enough qualified inspectors to ensure private sector compliance with labor
law, health, and safety standards. Review at least on an annual basis the need
to increase the number of inspectors.
Increase the number of routine periodic spot inspections to
ensure effective application of health, safety, and labor laws.
Mandate that the Ministry of Labor’s Individual Complaints
Department forward all complaints of labor law violations to the Inspections Department.
Inspectors should investigate and pursue penalties, including fines, for any
employer who violates the law, whether or not the employer and complaining
worker settle their dispute in mediation.
Create a unit within the Ministry of Labor to monitor treatment
of migrant domestic workers. Require that domestic workers appear at this
office at least once in the first three months of employment, and once a year
after that, for a private interview with an inspector to discuss his or her
working conditions and to flag any violations. Ensure the availability of
qualified interpreters.
Give inspectors authority to issue fines and other penalties for
violation of laws and regulations or noncompliance with Ministry of Labor
orders.
Establish procedures and schedules for inspectors to conduct
follow-up inspections of documented violations and transfer these violations to
the judicial system so that courts can issue fines and other penalties mandated
by law.
Impose meaningful consequences, including fines, for violations
of health and safety standards and labor laws, particularly in cases of
withheld wages and serious health and safety hazards. Employers who fail to
comply quickly with inspector warnings and orders, or who are found to
repeatedly violate health, safety, and labor standards, should lose their
operating permits and face maximum penalties.
Launch urgent special inspections campaigns focusing on common
violations of migrant worker rights, including campaigns to eliminate fire
hazards in labor camps and expose employers who withhold wages. Impose
meaningful fines on violating employers and prohibit them from recruiting new
workers.
Extend to domestic workers all legal and regulatory
protections that apply to other workers, including provisions related to
periods of daily and weekly rest, overtime pay, employment mobility, LMRA
jurisdiction, and wage discrimination. Introduce additional protections to
address the specific nature of domestic work, such as working hours that
allow for rest periods during the workday, the need for safe and private
living accommodation, and a worker’s dependence on her employer for
adequate food.
Strengthen provisions of the standard employment contract for
domestic workers to meet protections outlined in the ILO Convention on domestic
work. This includes specific provisions outlining terms of food, accommodation,
and repatriation, and ensuring terms of employment not less favorable than
those enjoyed by other workers generally, such as for hours of work, weekly
periods of rest, and overtime pay.
Ensure that all domestic workers receive information about
government complaint hotlines when they arrive in Bahrain, and staff hotlines
with employees who speak the languages that domestic workers most commonly
speak.
Initiate a public awareness campaign aimed at employers of
domestic workers to encourage them to treat domestic workers with dignity and
safeguard their rights. Solicit public support for the campaign from leaders
across Bahraini society.
Mandate payment of all wages into electronic banking
accounts accessible in Bahrain and sending countries, including India,
Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Ethiopia, Thailand, and the
Philippines.
Phase in a requirement that all workers, including domestic
workers, open accounts in an approved bank or government financial institution
to receive direct deposit of wages.
Work with banks, NGOs, and international institutions such as the
World Bank, the International Organization for Migration, and the ILO, to
provide financial literacy to migrant workers.
Enforce criminal and civil penalties for withholding wages.
Enforce prohibitions on employers’ confiscating
workers’ passports.
Publish and advertise widely a clear statement, issued by an
authoritative government body, highlighting this prohibition under the
anti-trafficking law, penal code provisions, and other laws. The statement
should outline meaningful penalties for violations and specifically include
employers of domestic workers.
Ensure speedy and full investigation and prosecution of employers
and recruiters who violate this prohibition.
Require that Bahrain-based labor recruitment agencies highlight
this prohibition to all employers.
Work with sending country embassies, expatriate clubs, and
employers to create passport repositories to provide workers with secure and
accessible locations to store their documents.
Address limitations on freedom of movement for migrant
workers.
Eliminate the requirement that a sponsor cancel a migrant
worker’s work permit in order for the worker to leave Bahrain freely. In
the interim, ensure that workers can leave the country without employer
authorization and without undue delay, unless he or she is a defendant in a
pending legal proceeding and a duly authorized court has restricted his or her
travel.
Remove the requirement that workers stay with an employer one
year before they can freely change jobs for workers who earn less than BD200
monthly and have registered a labor complaint with the Ministry of Labor or
criminal complaints police or the Public Prosecution.
Reduce notice-of-termination requirements to one month for workers
who earn less than BD200 monthly and are seeking to transfer employment without
their employer’s permission, in light of the fact that most low-income
workers lack the bargaining power to negotiate their contracts, and that prompt
transfer of these employees will not unduly harm employers’ interests.
Waive all notice requirements for transferring employment by
workers who file labor or criminal complaints of employer abuse with the police,
the Public Prosecution Office, or Ministry of Labor.
Develop an insurance scheme for not-at-fault employers to offset
financial losses such as recruitment fees if a migrant employee, including a
migrant domestic worker, chooses to leave his or her employment prematurely.
Provide a pathway to legal employment for out-of-status and
“free visa’” workers whose immigration/work status resulted
from human trafficking or leaving employment due to work-related abuses. Create
a national manpower agency that can match out-of-status and “free
visa” migrant workers with legal employment opportunities.
Provide effective protection, shelter, and support
services to migrant workers who experience abuse, including forced labor,
physical abuse, or sexual abuse.
Provide psychological counseling and medical treatment for all
workers who suffer physical, psychological, or sexual abuse.
Require police officials to transfer domestic workers who report
abuse via hotlines to shelters, in accordance with procedures similar to those
for workers who report abuse at police stations.
Staff shelters with employees who speak languages most often
spoken by migrant workers.
Ensure effective criminal investigations and prosecutions in
cases where crimes of physical abuse have taken place.
Take stronger measures to identify, investigate, and
punish recruitment agencies and informal labor brokers who charge workers
illegal fees or engage in other illegal and unethical practices.
Require that Bahraini agencies and employers exercise due
diligence in screening recruitment agencies they partner with in labor-sending
countries in order to avoid contracting with abusive, exploitative and
unethical recruiters.
Require that employers of workers who are found to have paid a
recruiting fee reimburse their employees.
Coordinate closely with the governments of India, the
Philippines, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Pakistan, Ethiopia, Bangladesh, and other
labor-sending countries to identify and penalize companies in Bahrain that are
doing business with recruitment agencies and middlemen in Bahrain and abroad
who unlawfully charge workers fees for travel, visas, or employment contracts.
Penalize agencies and employers that knowingly do business with
recruiters who unlawfully charge workers fees in sending countries.
Penalize employers, recruiting agencies, and individuals who
unlawfully charge workers recruitment fees, including by revoking their
operating license and prosecuting them as applicable under the anti-trafficking
law.
Adopt minimum wage legislation in compliance with
international standards.
In the interim, cooperate with labor-sending countries to
establish a minimum wage in migrant workers’ employment contracts and
ensure that foreign embassies be allowed to reject contracts that do not meet
their countries’ base employment standards. Ensure that such measures
apply to domestic workers.
Expand public information campaigns and training programs
to educate migrant workers, including domestic workers and employers,
about Bahraini labor policies, with an emphasis on worker rights and
remedies.
Create a mandatory orientation for all incoming migrant workers,
including domestic workers, about their rights and obligations in Bahrain and
information about how to seek assistance. The orientation course should be a
requirement for a work permit and be available in the languages most often
spoken by migrant workers in Bahrain.
Create a mandatory orientation for employers of migrant workers,
including for employers of migrant domestic workers, to inform them about
workers’ rights and obligations under Bahraini law. This should include
information about requirements and penalties under recent reforms.
Ensure that public information campaigns emphasize workers’
rights to change employers without the employer’s permission, and to keep
their passports. Campaigns should include information about how to seek redress
for alleged abuses through the appropriate ministry or hotline.
Expat Guilds and LMRA radio programs should include comprehensive
information about workers’ rights, describe common violations against
workers such as withheld wages, and provide workers with information about the
process of seeking redress and which government agencies can help with this.
Make Expat Guilds available in all government buildings and other areas
commonly frequented by migrant workers, such as expat clubs, foreign embassies,
remittance agencies, and key locations in sending countries.
Establish one or more “one-stop” centers where
workers can find representatives of various ministries and offices they must
deal with in filing and resolving complaints of rights
violations—including representatives of the LMRA, the Ministry of Labor,
the Ministry of Justice and Islamic Affairs, police, and the Directorate of
Nationality, Residency and Passports.
Ensure the safety and protection of migrant laborers, including
those allegedly targeted by gangs, and conduct prompt investigations in
order to bring those responsible to justice.
Ratify relevant international human rights treaties and
take steps to fulfill existing obligations.
Ratify the International Convention on the Protection of the
Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.
Ratify the new ILO Convention No. 189 on decent work for domestic
workers.
Take steps to meet all recommendations made by the Universal
Periodic Review working group to Bahrain during its 2008 UPR and by the CEDAW
committee in 2008 regarding migrant workers, including adopting comprehensive
labor reforms for migrant domestic workers.
Ratify ILO Convention No. 81 on
inspections and No. 131 on fixing a minimum wage.
Ratify other key outstanding ILO
core conventions: No. 87 on freedom of association, No. 98 on the right to
organize and collective bargaining, No. 100 on equal remuneration, No. 111 on
employment discrimination, and No. 138 on the minimum age.
To the Governments of Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Nepal,
Ethiopia, Indonesia, Bangladesh, India, Thailand, and the Philippines
Establish labor departments, headed by qualified labor
attachés, in your embassies and consulates, commensurate in size and
resources to the number of working nationals in Bahrain.
Coordinate with the Bahrain government to identify companies
doing business with recruitment agencies and informal middlemen, in your
country or in Bahrain, which unlawfully charge workers fees for travel, visas,
or employment contracts.
Urge the Bahrain government to enforce its labor and criminal
laws, hold violators fully accountable, and expand labor protections to
domestic workers.
Provide workers with essential services in Bahrain, including
information about worker rights and redress, attorneys, and timely issuance of
out-passes or passports.
Pakistan, Nepal, Ethiopia, Thailand, and India should ratify the
International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers
and Members of Their Families.
Ratify the recently adopted ILO convention on treatment of
domestic workers.
To Bahraini Companies
Make public commitments to
protect the rights of all workers associated with your project(s),
including pledges to:
take all possible steps to
ensure no workers have paid fees associated with their recruitment and
reimburse workers who have paid any such fees in contravention of local
law; strictly prohibit the
retention of workers’ passports or other identity documents,
including by subcontractors or intermediaries, and ensure that safe
storage facilities where they can access such documents are made
availableensure that all workers sign
enforceable employment contracts in a language that they understand prior
to their migration; ensure on-time payment in full of workers’
wages from the first month of their employment, paid on a no less than
monthly basis;and ensure adequate housing
facilities for all workers in accordance with domestic and international
standards
Inform workers of their rights under Bahraini law in
languages that they understand, including rights to overtime rates, to minimum
numbers of days off and holidays, to health and safety information, to
medical care, and to appropriate accommodation.
Regularly collect and make public data on the number and
kinds of occupational injuries and accidents on worksites.
Mani
Mostofi, Tolan Fellow in the Middle East and North Africa Division at Human
Rights Watch, wrote this report based on research that he and Kanwal Hameed,
consultant for Human Rights Watch, conducted in Bahrain. Faraz Sanei,
researcher in the Middle East and North Africa Division, provided research
assistance. Joe Stork, deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa
Division; Nisha Varia, senior researcher in the Women’s Rights Division;
Danielle Haas and Tom Porteous in the Human Rights Watch Program Office;
Priyanka Motaparthy, researcher in the Women’s Rights Division, and
Arvind Ganesan, director of Human Rights Watch’s Business and Human
Rights program, provided editorial review. Clive Baldwin, senior legal advisor,
provided legal review. Amr Khairy, Arabic language website and translation
coordinator, and Rola Awada, associate with the Middle East and North Africa Division,
arranged translation of this report into Arabic. Leah Caldwell, Tyson Patros,
Mariam Bin Ghaith, Sheila Lalwani, Hebah Albiti, Omar Sabry, Mandy McClure, and
Salma Abdou, interns at Human Rights Watch, provided research assistance and
help with translation. Asra Jabeen Syed provided manuscript review. Adam Coogle
and Arwa Abdelmoula, associates with the Middle East and North Africa Division,
formatted the report. Samer Muscati, researcher in the Middle East and North
Africa Division, also provided research assistance and photography. Grace Choi,
publications director, Kathy Mills, publications specialist and Fitzroy
Hepkins, mail manager, prepared the report for publication.
Human Rights
Watch would also like to express appreciation for the assistance of Harry Lambert
of Doughty Street Chambers, and, in Bahrain, of CARAM-Asia; Marietta Dias and Noora
Feleyfel, chair and vice chair of the Migrant Workers Protection Society; Beverley
Hamadeh and Jaishankar M., current and former general secretaries of the
Migrant Workers Protection Society; Szalay and Evon Bhaskaran, head and
assistant head of the Migrant Workers Protection Society Action Committee;
Charanath Sivakumar and S. Sathis Kumar, former heads of the Migrant Workers
Protection Society Safety and Welfare Committee; Mehru Vesuvala and Malika
Maline Ruberia of the Migrant Workers Protection Society; Florine Mathis, former
head of the Migrant Workers Protection Society shelter; Mona Almoayyed and
Alfredo Loyola D’Souza, former chair and vice chair of the Migrant Workers
Protection Society; journalist Khalil Bohazza; labor lawyers Maha Jaber and
Lateesh Bharathan; and Karim Radhi of the General Federation of Bahrain Trade
Unions; Faisal Fulad and Ateyatalla Rowhani from the Bahrain Human Rights Watch
Society (not affiliated with Human Rights Watch); Abdulla al-Derazi, then secretary-general
of the Bahrain Human Rights Society; Ben Millington, formerly of Construction
Week magazine; Begena Pradeep of the Gulf Daily News; Gebe George,
Fayez Abubacker, and Abdul Bashar Muksed Miah for assisting as interpreters;
Said Yousif Almuhafdah of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights; and Nabeel
Rajab, chairperson of CARAM-ASIA and president of the Bahrain Center for Human
Rights.
The appendices for this report are available at:
http://hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/bahrain1012_appendices.pdf
International
Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members
of Their Families (Migrant Workers Convention), adopted December 18, 1990, G.A.
Res. 45/158, annex, 45 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 49A) at 262, U.N. Doc. A/45/49
(1990), entered into force July 1, 2003, art. 2.2.
Labor
Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain, “Table A.
Estimated total employment by citizenship and sector 2002-2011,” http://www.lmra.bh/blmi (accessed July 12, 2012). The UN State
of World Population 2011 put the total population at 1.3 million: see
http://www.unfpa.org/swp/ (accessed February 20, 2012 ), p. 116. In February
2008 the government’s Central Informatics Organization revised sharply
upwards (and retroactively) the figure for total population to more than one
million, including 512,000 expatriates—an increase of some 42 percent
over its prior total population figure of 740,000. The UN State of World
Population in 2010 recorded Bahrain’s population at 800.00; the 1.3
million recorded in 2011 marked a 62 percent increase. The Economist
Intelligence Unit interpreted the government’s 2008 upward revision to
reflect the fact that the authorities had previously seriously underestimated
the number of foreign workers (Bahrain: Country Profile 2009, p. 14). In
response to complaints from al-Wifaq, the largest opposition bloc in the
National Assembly, which represents mainly Shia constituents, the government
conducted an investigation that reportedly cleared officials of negligence or
manipulation of the data. Al-Wifaq dismissed the report as a whitewash. See
“Bahrain Shia MPs walk out over population row,” Reuters, May 14,
2008. See also Hassan M. Fattah, “Report Cites Bid by Sunnis in Bahrain
to Rig Elections,” New York Times, October 2, 2006, p. A3. On October
30, 2009, after authorities reportedly refused to accept a petition signed by
190 opposition figures, thousands of demonstrators “formed a 3-kilometer
human chain in the capital Manama to protest what the opposition describes as
an effort to change the demography of largely Shiite Bahrain and influence the
outcome of elections.” See “Thousands demonstrate against
naturalization law in Bahrain,” DPA, October 31, 2009, reproduced at
http://sify.com/news/thousands-demonstrate-against-naturalisation-law-in-bahrain-news-international-jk4w4cgahhf.html
(accessed January 12, 2010).
Labor
Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain, Bahrain Labor Market
Indicators, http://www.lmra.bh/blmi (accessed July 12, 2012); all labor market
statistics found in this report are based on numbers made available by the LMRA
on its website or the General Organization for Social Insurance (GOSI). Some
statistics based on private sector employment may not account for undocumented
workers. As of July 2012, except where noted, the latest available LMRA or GOSI
numbers were from the first quarter of 2011 or fourth quarter 2011. This is a
departure from the LMRA’s practice up through 2010, when the LMRA updated
all its data on a quarterly basis to reflect to most recently completed
quarter.
For discussions of the role of migrant labor in Bahrain’s development see
Rob Franklin, “Migrant labor and the politics of development in
Bahrain,” MERIP Reports, vol.132 (1985) and Laurence Louer,
“The Political Impact of Labor Migration in Bahrain,” City &
Society, vol. 20, issue 1 (2008). On the history and dynamics of the South
Asian expatriate and migrant worker communities in Bahrain, see Andrew Gardner,
City of Strangers: Gulf Migration and the Indian Community in Bahrain
(Cornell University Press, 2010).
Labor
Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain, Bahrain Labor Market
Indicators, http://www.lmra.bh/blmi (accessed July 12,
2012); Labor Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain,
“Table 17: low wages by sex, citizenship,” http://www.lmra.bh/blmi (July 12, 2012); Labor Market
Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain, “Table A: total
employment by citizenship, sector: 2002 2011,” http://www.lmra.bh/blmi (accessed July 12, 2012). NOTE: Total
percent of low-income earning migrant workers is estimated by using LMRA data
on the number of low-wage private sector migrant workers (which includes
individuals making less than BD 200 monthly) and adding all migrant workers
employed in the domestic sector (who average BD 70 monthly) and dividing that
by the total number of migrant workers in Bahrain. The LMRA market indicators
do not provide a breakdown of wage distribution in the domestic sphere.
Labor Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain, “Table A2:
Total employment (Female) by citizenship, sector,” http://www.lmra.bh/blmi (July 12, 2012).
Labor Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain,
“Table A1: Total employment (Male) by citizenship, sector,”; and
Table 6: “Number of workers by sex, Bahraini, Non-Bahraini citizenship,
and branch of economic activity: 2011 December,” http://blmi.lmra.bh/2011/12/mi_data.xml
(accessed July 12, 2012).
Ibid; Labor Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of
Bahrain, “Table A: total employment by citizenship, sector:
2002 2011,” http://blmi.lmra.bh/2011/12/mi_data.xml
(accessed July 12, 2012).
Human Rights Watch Interview with Ali Radhi, then Chief Executive Officer of
the Labor Market Regulatory Authority, Manama, February 2, 2010.
Ibid;
Law no. 19 for the year 2006 Regulating the Labor Market, art. 27. Migrants
employed in skilled professions are more likely to bring their families with
them, while most migrant workers cannot afford to do so.
Labor
Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain,
“Table B06. Estimated average basic wages by citizenship and sector
(Construction): 2002 2011,”
http://blmi.lmra.bh/2011/12/mi_data.xml (accessed July 12, 2012).
Human Rights Watch group
interview with the Migrant Workers Protection Society Action Committee, Manama,
January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch Interview with the
chair of the Bahrain Recruiters Society, Fareed al-Mahmeed, Manama, January 28
2010.
Labor Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain, “Table A:
total employment by citizenship, sector: 2002 2011,”
http://www.lmra.bh/blmi (accessed July 12, 2012).
Human Rights Watch interview with Marietta Dias, Migrant Workers Protection
Society, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with then Minister of Labor, Majeed Al Alawi, Isa
Town, February 4, 2010;
Minister Al Alawi also compared the kafala
system to slavery in his effort to pass the mobility law: see Mohammed
Harmassi, “Bahrain to end ‘slavery’ system,” BBC Arabic
Service Radio, May 6, 2009,
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8035972.stm
(accessed September 5, 2010).
“HM King Hamad Issues Law 15/2011,” Bahrain News Agency,
June, 16, 2011 http://bna.bh/portal/en/news/461096 (accessed February 21.
2012).
See:
Benjamin Millington, “Camp conditions in Bahrain questioned,” Construction
Weekly Online, March 28, 2009, http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article-4745-camp_conditions_in_bahrain_questioned/
(accessed August 19, 2010); Benjamin Millington, “5000 al-Hamad workers
on strike,” Construction Weekly Online, June 10, 2009,
http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article-5494-5000-al-hamad-workers-on-strike/(accessed
August 19, 2010); Benjamin Millington, “Bahrain: 75 workers call
strike,” Construction Weekly Online, June 10, 2009,
http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article-5545-bahrain_75_workers_call_strike/(accessed
August 19, 2010); Aniqa Haider, “Worker flies home after wife’s
threat,” Gulf Daily News, May 21, 2010,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=278475 (accessed August
19, 2010); Aniqa Haider, “70 workers in wages appeal,” Gulf
Daily News, September 8, 2011, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=313111
(accessed April 19, 2012); Aniqa Haider, “Worker’s plea to
embassy,” Gulf Daily News, September 9, 2011,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=313188 (accessed April
19, 2012); Mandeep Singh, “Worker’s fury over tragedy,” Gulf
Daily News, April 6, 2012,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=327382 (accessed April
19, 2012); Aniqa Haider, “Workers end protest,” Gulf Daily News,
April 7, 2012, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=327432
(accessed April 19, 2012).
Aniqa
Haider, “Strikes on the rise,” Gulf Daily News, April 10,
2010, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=275350
(accessed August 19, 2010).
United Nations Webcast, Human Rights Council, Twelfth
Session, Bahrain
http://www.unmultimedia.org/tv/webcast/c/13thbahrain.html
Human
Rights Watch Interview with the chair of the Bahrain Recruiters Society,
Fareed al-Mahmeed, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with a document clearance agent who requested not to be
named, Manama, April 15, 2010.
Law
no. 19 for the year 2006 Regulating the Labor Market Section 2, art. 28.
Human Rights Watch Interview with the chair of the Bahrain Recruiters Society,
Fareed al-Mahmeed, Manama, January 28 2010.
Bahrain
Penal Code and its’ Amendments, No. 15 of 1976, art. 302, as amended by
Legislative decree No. 6 of 1993, art. 2.
Human Rights Watch Interview with the chair of the Bahrain Recruiters Society,
Fareed al-Mahmeed, Manama, January 28, 2010; Ministry of Industry and Commerce,
Kingdom of Bahrain, Residence Permits, http://www.moic.gov.bh/MoIC/En/MoIC+Centers/BahrainInvestorsCenter/Post+Registration+Services/ResidencePermit/;
Fees and Payments, ; Residency permits run 22BD (US$ 58) and
work visas run 200BD (US$531) however other fees may apply.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with the chair of the Bahrain Recruiters Society, Fareed
al-Mahmeed, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Under
the original fee structure, 20 percent of the revenue raised by from employers
went towards the LMRA budget and 80 percent to the Tamkeen (labor fund), which
offers training and consultation to small businesses. Tamkeen’s training
program was designed to help make Bahraini citizens more competitive in the
labor mark. Bahraini companies protested the fee, staging a demonstration at
the LMRA claiming the additional costs were hurting their businesses. See:
Benjamin Millington. “Contractors protest but LMRA stands by labour fees,”
Construction Week Online, March 22, 2009, http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article-4705-contractors_protest_but_lmra_stands_by_labour_fees/
(accessed August 17, 2010). Some migrant worker advocates feared that employers
would saddle workers with the BD10 fees but Human Rights Watch found no
evidence pointing to such a practice. Human Rights Watch also found no evidence
to suggest that withheld wages were linked to the BD10 monthly LMRA fees.
“Fees Reprieve,” LMRA Media Blog, December 5, 2011,
http://blog.lmra.bh/en/archives/1298 (accessed February 21, 2012);
Law
no. 19 for the year 2006 Regulating the Labor Market section 2, art. 29.
Human Rights Watch interview with a document clearance agent who requested not
to be named, Manama, April 15, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Muhammad Rizvi Muhammad Siddeek, Manama, January 30,
2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Sabir Illahi, Manama, February 3, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Purveen G. (pseudonym), Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with the chair of the Bahrain Recruiters Society, Fareed
al-Mahmeed, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Maria C. (pseudonym), Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch Interview with Suresh Podar, Manama, January 25, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Sant Kumar, Manama, January 25, 2010.
Response
of the Government of Bahrain to Human Rights Watch written inquiry, September
9, 2010. On file with Human Rights Watch.
Ministry
of Labor statistics provided in response to Human Rights Watch query, letter of
June 13, 2010. On file with Human Rights Watch.
Mansoor al-Jamri, “Indian Ambassador in Manama Moham Kumar to al-Wasat:
The Indian Community is Known for its Friendly Relations with Everyone, We Have
Not Recorded Any Targeting for Political Purposes,” Al-Wasat,
(Arabic) April 10, 2012,
http://www.alwasatnews.com/3503/news/read/654845/1.html (accessed May 10,
2012).
Mubeen
Junaideenge and Rezwan, Manama, January 30, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with immigration officer, name withheld on request,
Manama January 25, 2010; Tommy Hahratty, “Sponsor denies salon
worker’s BD 1,500, payout claim,” Gulf Daily News, July 22,
2010, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=282817 (accessed
August 21, 2010).
Human Rights Watch interview with Evone Bhaskaran, Manama, June 6, 2010;
Bhaskaran is the assistant head of the Action Committee of the Migrant Workers
Protection Society and is providing updates on the cases of Mubeen Junaideenge
and Rezwan, both of whom Human Rights Watch interviewed in Manama, January 30,
2010.
Human Rights Watch Interview with Mukhtar Mojibur Rehman, Manama, June 5, 2010.
The
agency in charge of immigration services and regulations in Bahrain is called
the General Directorate of Nationality, Passport and Residence and is housed in
the Ministry of Interior.
Migrant
Workers Protection Society,
Human Rights Watch phone interview with Maha Jaber, Manama, September 7, 2010.
The Urgent Matters court takes cases deemed to require immediate resolution.
The Court of Execution is empowered to enforce final judgments from other
courts.
Response of the Government of Bahrain to Human Rights Watch written inquiry,
September 9, 2010; on file with Human Rights Watch.
Bahrain
Penal Code and its Amendments, No. 15 of 1976, art. 389.
Law
No. 1 (2008) with Respect to Trafficking in Persons.
Human Rights Watch interview with Brig. Tariq Mubarak Bin Daineh, then
undersecretary of the Ministry of Interior, and other Interior Ministry
officials, including Lt. Col. Ghazi Saleh al-Sena, director of Investigation
and Follow Up of the General Directorate of Nationality, Passport and Residence
at Ministry of Interior, and Brig. Ibrahim al-Ghaith, inspector general of the
Ministry of Interior, Manama, January 29, 2010.
Human Rights Watch Interview with Attorney General Al Buainian, Manama, June 7,
2010.
Human
Rights Watch group interview with the Migrant Workers Protection
Society’s Action Committee, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Nadia Khalil al-Qaheri, head of the Labor
Complaints Section at the Ministry of Labor, Isa Town, February 4, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Lt. Col. Ghazi Saleh al-Senan, director of
Follow Up and Investigation at the General Directorate of Nationality, Passport
and Residence, Ministry of Interior, Manama, February 2, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with immigration officer, name withheld on request,
Manama, January 25, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Lt. Col. Ghazi Saleh al-Senan, director of Follow
Up and Investigation at the General Directorate of Nationality, Passport and
Residence, Ministry of Interior, Manama, February 2, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Ali Radhi, then Chief executive officer, LMRA,
Manama, February 2, 2010. Radhi was removed from office in March 2011 during the
government crackdown on pro-democracy protests after callers on state
television accused him of discrimination against Sunnis. Andrew Hammond,
“Bahrain economic reforms take hit as hardliners battle uprising,”
Reuters, June 13, 2012 http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/mideast-money-bahrain-economic-reforms-takes-hit-as-hardliners-battle-uprising
(accessed Juily 19, 2012).
Human
Rights Watch group interview with the Migrant Workers Protection Society Action
Committee, Manama, January 28, 2010; Human Rights Watch interview with labor
attorney Maha Jaber, Manama, January 31, 2010; Human Rights Watch interview
with social worker, name withheld on request, Manama, February 1, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Marietta Dias, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Manama, January 24, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Nadia Khalil al-Qaheri, Manama, February 4, 2010.
See
Aniqa Haider, “Worker flies home after wife’s threat,” Gulf
Daily News, May 21, 2010, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=278475
(accessed August 20, 2010).
Mansoor Al-Jamri, “Indian Ambassador in Manama Moham Kumar to al-Wasat:
The Indian Community is Known for its Friendly Relations with Everyone, We Have
Not Recorded Any Targeting for Political Purposes,” Al-Wasat,
(Arabic) April 10, 2012,
http://www.alwasatnews.com/3503/news/read/654845/1.html (accessed May 10,
2012).
Ministry
of Labor statistics provided in response to Human Rights Watch query, letter of
June 13, 2010. On file with Human Rights Watch.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Annjee, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Bahrain
Penal Code and its Amendments, No. 15 of 1976, art. 302, as amended by
Legislative decree No. 6 of 1993, art. 2.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Acihi binti Mahid, Manama, January 31, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Lawrence Sarwansingh, Manama, February 3, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Ali Radhi, then Chief Executive Officer, LMRA,
Manama, February 2, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Acihi binti Mahid, Manama, January 31, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Maha Jaber, labor attorney, Manama, February 1,
2010.
“Pay
Protest by Workers,” Gulf Daily News, October 28, 2009,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=262581 (accessed July
11, 2010); Ben Millington “38 Workers Strike in Bahrain,” Construction
Weekly Online, October 25, 2009,
http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article-6738-38-workers-strike-in-bahrain/
(accessed August 4, 2010).
Human
Rights Watch interview with lawyer Maha Jaber, Manama, February 1, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Sabir Illhai, Manama, February 3, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, Isa Town, February 4, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Maha Jaber, Manama, February 1, 2010. On June 8,
2010, Ahmed Alhaiki, director of Inspection and Labor Unions for the Minister
of Labor, told Human Rights Watch that authorities had canceled Muhammad Ali
al-Asfoor’s seven commercial registration licenses (CR), including
several he had obtained using the identities of family members. Companies
require a CR in order to legally conduct any business in Bahrain and obtain
work visas for migrant workers. Employers in Bahrain that have their CR
cancelled sometimes use other identities to obtain a CR, continue operations,
and continue recruiting migrant workers. Human Rights Watch does not know if
al-Asfoor has continued to do business despite lack of required licenses. Ahmed
Alaiki, however, told Human Rights Watch that al-Asfoor “is
finished.”
Human
Rights Watch interview with Purveen G. (pseudonym) plus five co-workers,
Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Sabir Illhai, Manama, February 3, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Purveen G. (pseudonym) plus five co-workers,
Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Purveen G. (pseudonym), Manama, January 28,
2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Purveen G. (pseudonym) plus five co-workers,
Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch Interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, head of the Department of
Inspections, Ministry of Labor, Isa Town, June 8, 2010.
In July 2011 Gulf Daily News reported that 16 workers had won a legal
battle against their employer for back wages. Some of the facts of the Gulf
Daily News report indicate that these workers could be some of the same
workers who filed a complaint against Al-Asfoor. In both cases the workers were
Indian, sued for three months of wages, and were represented by attorney Maha
Jaber—who is the lawyer retained by the Indian embassy and who thus
handles many such cases. The time frame for the start of the case reported by
the Gulf Daily News roughly corresponded to the timeframe offered by
Jaber when Human Rights Watch interviewed her in January 2010. The company
found liable in the Gulf Daily News article was Corus Building
Construction Company, not Al-Asfoor, but representatives of the Ministry of
Labor told Human Rights Watch in June 2010 that Al-Asfoor’s owner had
registered his business under several different names, a practice rights
advocates reported as not uncommon of employers found by authorities to violate
the labor laws. The original complaint involved 42 workers. However, in January
2010 Jaber told Human Rights Watch that months after filing suit many of her
clients were accepting extremely meager settlements and leaving the country
because the case was moving slowly. See: Aniga Haider, “Salary row
16 win legal battle,” Gulf Daily News, July 1, 2011,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=308986 (accessed June
9, 2012).
Begena Pradeep, “Wildcat Strike,” Gulf Daily News, June 11,
2009, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=252965 (accessed
June 24, 2012); Benjamin Millington, “Strike over as Al Hamad accepts
worker demands,” ,
June 11, 2009,
http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article-5512-strike_over_as_al_hamad_accepts_worker_demands/
(accessed July 10, 2010).
Ibid; Begena Pradeep, “Strike called off,” Gulf Daily News,
June 12, 2009, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=253051
(accessed August 7, 2012).
Benjamin Millington, “Al Hamad workers on strike in Bahrain,” , November 16,
2009,
http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article-6926-al-hamad-workers-strike-in-bahrain/
(accessed July 10, 2010).
Aniqa Haider, “1,100 workers on strike over pay,” Gulf Daily
News, December 12, 2011, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=319483
(accessed June 24, 2012); Aniqa Haider, “Wage row workers may fly home
soon,” Gulf Daily News, December 23, 2012
[http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=320162 (accessed
June 24, 2012).
Human
Rights Watch interview with Karim Radhi, representative of the General
Federation for Bahrain Trade Unions, Manama, May 24, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Alejandro S. Santos, Labor Attaché,
Embassy of the Philippines, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch Interview with the chair of the Bahrain Recruiters Society,
Fareed al-Mahmeed, , Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Marietta Dias, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Manama, January 24, 2010.
Mansoor al-Jamri, “Indian Ambassador in Manama Moham Kumar to Al-Wasat:
The Indian Community is Known for its Friendly Relations with Everyone, We Have
Not Recorded Any Targeting for Political Purposes,” Al-Wasat,
(Arabic), April 10, 2012, http://www.alwasatnews.com/3503/news/read/654845/1.html
(accessed May 10, 2012).
“Court Blow for Stranded Worker…” Gulf Daily News, June
29, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=308854 (accessed
March 1, 2012).
Mansoor al-Jamri, “Indian Ambassador in Manama Moham Kumar to Al-Wasat:
The Indian Community is Known for its Friendly Relations with Everyone, We Have
Not Recorded Any Targeting for Political Purposes,” Al-Wasat (Arabic),
April 10, 2012, http://www.alwasatnews.com/3503/news/read/654845/1.html
(accessed May 10, 2012).
Human
Rights Watch interview with carpenter, name withheld on request, Manama,
February 3, 2010.
Labor
Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA), Kingdom of Bahrain, “Table B:
Estimated Average Basic Wages by Citizenship and Sector,”
http://blmi.lmra.bh/2011/03/mi_data.xml (accessed February 21, 2010). The
figure for the average wages of migrant workers accounts for domestic workers,
who are excluded from the Bahraini government’s official reported average
wages.
Ibid., “Table 17: Number of Low Pay Workers by Sex,
Citizenship,” http://blmi.lmra.bh/2011/12/mi_data.xml (accessed July 12,
2012). The figure for the number of low wage earning migrant workers accounts
for all domestic workers, who are excluded from the Bahraini government’s
official statistic.
“Table B: Estimated Average
Basic Wages by Citizenship and Sector,”
http://blmi.lmra.bh/2011/03/mi_data.xml (accessed February 21, 2010).
Ibid.,
“Table 18: Wages Distribution by Sex, Citizenship,” http://blmi.lmra.bh/2010/09/mi_data.xml
(accessed December 10, 2010); “Table A. Estimated total employment by
citizenship and sector 2002-2011,” http://www.lmra.bh/blmi
(accessed February 20, 2012 ).
Begena
Pradeep, “Laborers Call Off March,” Gulf Daily News,
February 11, 2008
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=208391 (accessed July
10, 2010); “Bahrain: 2,000 workers Strike of Pay Dispute,” Zawya,
February 11, 2008, http://www.zawya.com/story.cfm/sidZAWYA20080211035037/Bahrain:%202,000%20labourers%20on%20strike%20over%20pay%20dispute
(accessed July 10, 2010).
Begena Pradeep, “Laborers Call Off March,” Gulf Daily News,
February 11, 2008 http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=208391
(accessed July 10, 2010).
G.P. Zachariades response to Human Rights Watch query, letter of August 7,
2012, on file with Human Rights Watch and reproduced in the appendices to this
report, http://www.hrw.org/node/110207/
Human Rights Watch interview with Aumar Perdshe, Manama, January 27, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Maria C. (pseudonym), Manama, January 28, 2010.
Bahrain
Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 23 of 1976, art. 79, as amended by
Legislation Decree No.14 of 1993, Gazette (issue No.2080), October 16, 1993.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Lawrence Sarwansingh, Manama, February 3, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Sant Kumar, Manama, January 25, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Rami V. (pseudonym), Riffa, January 25, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with representatives of Kerala Pravasi Study
Center who requested anonymity, Manama, January 25, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Muhammad Rizvi Muhammad Siddeek, Manama, January
30, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Suresh Podar, January 25, 2010.
See Ben Millington “Camp conditions in Bahrain questioned,” Construction
Weekly Online, March 28, 2009;
http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article-4745-camp_conditions_in_bahrain_questioned/
(accessed August 21, 2010).
Human
Rights Watch interview with cleaning company workers who requested anonymity,
Barbar, June 4, 2010; Embassy for the Kingdom of Bahrain to the United States,
History and Geography; http://www.bahrainembassy.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=section.home&id=80
(accessed December 18, 2010).
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Prasad Singorapu Kummari and Vishnu Naraya, Manama,
January 30, 2010.
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, May 23, 2012.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Lawrence Sarwansingh, Manama, February 3, 2010.
Ministry
of Labor, General Safety Requirements for Labor Accommodations
Human
Rights Watch interview with a cleaning company employee who requested
anonymity, Barbar, June 4, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Aumar Perdshe, Manama, January 27, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Dariah binti Narwita, Manama, January 31,
2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Maria C. (pseudonym), Manama, January 28,
2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Suresh Podar, Manama, January 25, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Acihi binti Mahid, January 31, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Aumar Perdshe, Manama, January 27, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Elma V. who requested her last name be withheld,
Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Madelle D., Manama, January 28, 2010.
Aniqa
Haider, “Surge in Suicides Sparks Action Call,” Gulf Daily News,
January 31, 2010,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=269571 (accessed July
11, 2010).
“Two Ethiopian Maids Commit Suicide in Bahrain in Less than a
Week,” Migrant Rights,
http://www.migrant-rights.org/2010/01/16/two-ethiopian-maids-commit-suicide-in-bahrain-in-less-than-a-week/
(accessed July 11, 2010).
Aniqa
Haider, “Surge in Suicides Sparks Action Call,” Gulf Daily News.
“Four Domestic Workers Commit or Attempt Suicide in Bahrain in One
Week.” Migrant Rights,
http://www.migrant-rights.org/2010/05/04/four-domestic-workers-commit-or-attempt-suicide-in-bahrain-in-one-week/
(accessed July 11, 2010).
Human Rights Watch interview with Kanchana Padma Kumari, Manama, January 25,
2010.
Aniqa Haider, “Suicide welder was absent from work for a week,” Gulf
Daily News, June 28, 2012,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=333002 (accessed July
1, 2012). Aniqa Haider, “New drive to end suicides,” Gulf
Daily News, May 9, 2012,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=329663 (accessed May
21, 2012); “Suicides Alarm,” Gulf Daily News, April 15,
2012, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=327999 (accessed
May 21, 2012); Aniqa Haider, “Another suicide,” Gulf Daily News,
March 21, 2012, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=326230
(accessed May 21, 2012); Aniqa Haider, “Suicide woman’s body
awaiting repatriation,” Gulf Daily News, May 12, 2012,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=329920 (accessed May
21, 2012); “Suicide man’s body to be sent home,” Gulf
Daily News, April 30, 2012,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=329057 (accessed May
21, 2012); Aniqa Haider, “Family unaware of maid’s suicide,” Gulf
Daily News, February 25,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=324461 (accessed May
21, 2012).
Aniqa Haider, “New drive to end suicides,” Gulf Daily News,
May 9, 2012, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=329663
(accessed May 21, 2012).
Mansoor al-Jamri, “Indian Ambassador in Manama Moham Kumar to Al-Wasat:
The Indian Community is Known for its Friendly Relations with Everyone, We Have
Not Recorded Any Targeting for Political Purposes,” Al-Wasat,
April 10, 2012, http://www.alwasatnews.com/3503/news/read/654845/1.html
(accessed in Arabic May 10, 2012).
Aniqa Haidar, “Another worker commits Suicide,” Gulf Daily News,
June 18, 2012 http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=332278
(accessed July 1, 2012).
Aniqa Haidar, “Another worker commits Suicide,” Gulf Daily News,
June 18, 2012 http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=332278
(accessed July 1, 2012).
See Human Rights Watch, “Bahrain: Resolve Travel Ban Conundrum,”
January 17, 2012,
http://www.hrw.org/news/2012/01/16/bahrain-resolve-travel-ban-conundrum
(accessed June 30, 2012.
Human Rights Watch letters to Nass and other companies are available in the
appendices on the Web version of this report
http://www.hrw.org/node/110207/
Bahrain Legislative Decree No. 14 of 1993 with respect to Amending the Labor
Law for the Private Sector, No. 23 of 1976;”HM the King issues Law. 36
for the year 2012,” Bahrain News Agency, July 26, 2012,
http://www.bna.bh/portal/en/news/518556 (accessed August, 27 2012). Note:
The government amended the l1976 aw four times, most extensively in 1993. See:
Legislation Decree No.14 of 1993, Gazette (issue No.2080), October 16, 1993.
All migrant worker abuses highlighted in the report took place before the
introduction of the new labor law.
Ibid., art. 2, as amended by Legislation Decree No.14 of 1993, Gazette (issue
No.2080), October 16, 1993.
Bahrain
Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 23 of 1976, art. 78; Bahrain Labor Law
for the Private Sector, No. 36 of 2012, arts. 51,and 57.
Ibid.,
art. 80, as amended by Legislation Decree No.14 of 1993, Gazette (issue
No.2080), October 16, 1993.
Bahrain
Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 23 of 1976, art. 79 as amended by
Legislation Decree No.14 of 1993, Gazette (issue No.2080), October 16, 1993.; Bahrain
Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 36 of 2012, arts. 57 and 64.
Ibid., art. 80 as amended by Legislation Decree No.14 of 1993, Gazette (issue
No.2080), October 16, 1993; Bahrain Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 36 of
2012, art. 54
Bahrain
Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 23 of 1976, art. 38, as amended by
Legislation Decree No.14 of 1993, Gazette (issue No.2080), 16 October 1993;
Bahrain Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 36 of 2012, art. 20. According to
Article 68 of the 1976 law and Article 42 of the 2012 law wages may be
calculated by the hour, day, week, month, or piece-rate,
Bahrain Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 23 of 1976, art. 38, as amended
by Legislation Decree No.14 of 1993, Gazette (issue No.2080), 16 October 1993;
Bahrain Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 36 of 2012, art. 41.
Bahrain
Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 23 of 1976, art. 72,and 111 as amended by
Legislation Decree No.14 of 1993, Gazette (issue No.2080), 16 October 1993;
Bahrain Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 36 of 2012, art. 40 and 116..
Human Rights Watch interview with then Minister of Labor Majeed Al Alawi, Isa
Town, February 4, 2010.
Mohammed Al A’Ali, “New-look labour law is passed,” Gulf
Daily News, April 23, 2012,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=328687 (accessed June
9, 2012); Legislative Decree No. 14 of 1993 with respect to Amending the Labor
Law for the Private Sector, No. 23 of 1976;”HM the King issues Law. 36
for the year 2012,” Bahrain News Agency, July 26, 2012,
http://www.bna.bh/portal/en/news/518556 (accessed August, 27 2012).
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Karim Radhi, representative of the
General Federation for Bahrain Trade Unions, Manama, May 29, 2010.
Bahrain Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 36 of 2012, art. 101-107.
Bahrain Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 36 of 2012, arts. 120 and 121.
Soman Baby, “Workers Safe Under Labour Law,” Bahrain Tribune,
June 1, 2012.
Response to a Human Rights Watch request for updates from the Ministry of
Social Development to Human Rights Watch, May 28, 2012. On file with Human
Rights Watch.
Bahrain Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 36 of 2012, art. 2. Note:
Domestic workers are covered by 46 out of 197 articles in the new law.
Ibid. arts. 6, 19-21, 116, 119-16,
Ibid. art, 58, and chapters 12 and 13.
Minister
of Labor decree No. 8 (2005), entitled With Respect to a Model Form of
Employment Contract for Domestic Help and Similar Persons.
Human Rights Watch telephone interview with Lulwa Budalamah, public relations
officer, LMRA, June 3, 2012.
Sandeep Singh Grewal, “Protection vow,” Gulf Daily News,
March 11, 2012, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=325543
(accessed June 9, 2012).
Human
Rights Watch interview with then-Minister of Labor Majeed Al Alawi, Isa Town,
February 4, 2010.
Law no. 19 for the year 2006 Regulating the Labor Market, arts. 1 and 2.
Ibid;
Human Rights Watch Interview, Ali Radhi, then Chief Executive Officer, LMRA,
Manama, February 2, 2010.
Mohammed Al A’Ali, “Massive overhaul of LMRA sought,” Gulf
Daily News, May 18, 2012,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=306119 (accessed June
9, 2012).; Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Karim Radhi,
representative of the General Federation for Bahrain Trade Unions, April 5,
2012.
Human Rights Watch Interview, Ali Radhi, then Chief Executive Officer, LMRA, Manama,
June 8, 2010; Bonny Mascarenhas, “LMRA hope for Domestic
Workers,” Daily Tribune Bahrain, November 11, 2011, partial text
available at
http://www.dt.bh/archivenewsdetails.php?date=2011-11-17&key=301110213450&newsid=161111222928
(accessed March 1, 2012).
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, February 27, 2012.
Human Rights Watch telephone interview with Lulwa Budalamah, public relations
officer, LMRA, June 3, 2012.
United States Department of State, “2011 Trafficking in Persons Report:
Bahrain,” June 2011, www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2011 (accessed
February 13, 2012).
Decision 24 of 2007 on the Prohibition of Work During Mid-Day (Dhuhr Time).
Ministry of Social Development response to a Human Rights Watch request for
updates , May 28, 2012. On file with Human Rights Watch.
United States Department of State, “2011 Trafficking in Persons Report:
Bahrain,” June 2011, www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2011 (accessed
February 13, 2011); Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Karim Radhi,
representative of the General Federation for Bahrain Trade Unions, April 5,
2012.
Decision
No (53) of 2008 amending the Traffic Law No (9) of 1979.
See
Aniqa Haider, “Companies ‘putting profit before
lives’,” Gulf Daily News, December 29, 2010,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=238805 (accessed August
19, 2010).
Rasha
Al Qahtani, ”Crash fury over rogue truck firms,” Gulf Daily
News, January 18, 2010,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=268731 (accessed August
20, 2010).
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, February 27, 2012.
Rasha
Al Qahtani, ”Crash fury over rogue truck firms,” Gulf Daily
News, January 18, 2010,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=268731 (accessed August
20, 2010).
“HM King Hamad Issues Law 15/2011,” Bahrain News Agency,
June 18, 2011, http://bna.bh/portal/en/news/461096 (accessed April 20,
2012).
Human Rights Watch Interview with Ali Radhi, then chief executive officer,
LMRA, Manama, June 8, 2010.
Human Rights Watch Interview, Abdulla Mohammed Hussain, Assistant General
Secretary, GFBTU, Washington, D.C., October 6, 2011.
Labor Market Regulatory Authority, Labor Market Indicators,
http://blmi.lmra.bh/2011/03/mi_dashboard.xml (accessed April 19, 2012).
Raji Unnikrishnan, “’Mobility’ granted to 11,626,” Bahrain
Daily Tribune, February 18 2012.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Ali Radhi, then chief executive officer, LMRA,
Manama, June 8, 2010.
Human Rights Watch group interview with the Migrant Workers Protection Action
Committee, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch listened to several broadcasts of this program on the LMRA website at: Labor Market Regulatory Authority, Breakfast with the LMRA-Voice FM, http://portal.lmra.bh/english/podcast/category/1 (accessed October 5, 2010). Shows are broadcast in Hindi and Malayalam; the LMRA’s representative, Waheed Al Balushi, converses in English with the radio host who then translates for the audience.
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Ali Radhi, then chief executive
officer, LMRA, June 1, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch group interview with the Migrant Protection Worker Action
Committee, January 28, 2010; Human Rights Watch interview with Maha Jaber,
February 1, 2010; and Human Rights Watch interview with anonymous social
worker, February 1, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch email correspondence with Ali Radhi, then Chief executive officer,
LMRA, June 1, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch listened to several broadcasts of this program on the LMRA website
at: Labor Market Regulatory Authority, Breakfast with the LMRA-Voice FM,
http://portal.lmra.bh/english/podcast/category/1 (accessed October 5, 2010).
Shows are broadcast in Hindi and Malayalam; the LMRA’s representative,
Waheed Al Balushi, converses in English with the radio host who then translates
for the audience.
Sandeep Singh Grewal, “Guide for expat workers on way,” Gulf
Daily News, May 18, 2012,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=330311 (accessed June
9, 2012).
Labor
Market Regularly Authority, Foreign Workers Guide, updated February 9, 2010
http://portal.lmra.bh/english/page/show/2 (June 09, 2012).
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, Isa Town, February 4, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Nawaf Mohammed al-Mouada, Manama, February 3, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Sawar Ram Bala, Manama, February 5, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with the Attorney General, Manama, February 3,
2010; See: Code of Criminal Procedure, law no. (46) of 2002.
Human Rights Watch Interview with Fatima M., who requested her last name be
withheld, Manama, January 27, 2010. Some sending country governments lack
official diplomatic or consular presences in Bahrain, including Nepal, Ethiopia
and, until recently, Sri Lanka. In these case community clubs provide some
basic consular services, such as issuing out-passes, and at times assist
migrant workers with problems with their employment. In spring 2010, the Sri
Lankan government appointed the head of the Sri Lanka club to be its official
Consul General however the position is not fulltime.
Human Rights Watch Interview with Ali Radhi, then chief executive officer,
LMRA, Manama, February 2, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch group interview with the Migrant Workers Protection Society
‘s Action Committee, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch email correspondence with Beverley Hamadeh, Migrant Workers
Protection Society, Manama, June 7, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Noora Feleyfel, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Manama, June 6, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Faisal Hameed, Manama, June 5, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Noora Feleyfel, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Manama, June 6, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch group interview with Brig. Tariq bin Dina, undersecretary, Bahrain
Ministry of Interior and other Ministry of Interior officials, Manama, February
2, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Abd al-Wahab Rashid, Ministry of Interior,
head of human trafficking, Manama, February 2, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Noora Feleyfel, Migrant Workers Protection
Society, Manama, June 6, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Lt. Col. Ghazi Saleh al-Senan, director of Follow
Up and Investigation at the General Directorate of Nationality, Passport and
Residence, Ministry of Interior, Manama, February 2, 2010.
Response
of the Government of Bahrain to Human Rights Watch written inquiry, September
9, 2010. On file with Human Rights Watch.
Amr Selim interview with LMRA Weekly Show on Bahrain Radio 96.5FM,
“Mobility (Local Transfer),” March 6, 2012,
http://portal.lmra.bh/english/podcast/show/113 (accessed May 2, 2012).
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Muhammad Rizvi Muhammad Siddeek, Manama, January
30, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Marietta Dais, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Manama, January 28, 2010.
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=308854Human Rights Watch
email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society Executive
Committee, February 27, 2012.; Annual Survey of Violations of Trade Union Rights,
Bahrain-2012, International Trade Union Confederation, June 6, 2012,
http://survey.ituc-csi.org/Bahrain#tabs-1 (accessed June 24, 2012).
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, February 27, 2012.
Ibid; http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=308854
See: Save 100 friends trapped in Bahrain, AVAAZ.org, June 28, 2012
http://www.avaaz.org/en/petition/Save_100_friends_trapped_in_Bahrain/ (accessed
July 19, 2012).
Bahrain firm allows stranded Indian workers to leave,”
BBC News, July 18, 2012,
http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-18881796 (accessed July 19, 2012).
Save 100 friends trapped in Bahrain,Avaaz.org, June 28, 2012
http://www.avaaz.org/en/petition/Save_100_friends_trapped_in_Bahrain (accessed
July 19, 2012).
Labor Market Regulatory Authority, Labor Market Indicators, Breakup of
irregular workers in June 2010, http://blmi.lmra.bh/2010/06/mi_dashboard.xml
(accessed August 22, 2010). E-mail communication from the Migrant Workers
Protection Society, February 27, 2012.
Amr Selim interview with LMRA Weekly Show on Bahrain Radio 96.5FM,
“Mobility (Local Transfer),” March 6, 2012,
http://portal.lmra.bh/english/podcast/show/113 (accessed May 2, 2012).
Human Rights Watch interview with Dariah binti Narwita, Manama, January 31,
2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, Manama, February 4, 2010;
Human Rights Watch group interview with the Migrant Workers Protection
Society’s Action Committee, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, Manama, February 4, 2010.
Ministry of Social Development response to a Human Rights Watch request for
updates , May 28, 2012. On file with Human Rights Watch.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Asif S. (pseudonym), Manama, June 4, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, head of the Department of
Inspections, Ministry of Labor, Isa Town, February 4, 2010.
Mohammed Al A’Ali, “New-look labour law is passed,” Gulf
Daily News, April 23, 2012,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=328687 (accessed June
9, 2012).
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, head of the Department of
Inspections, Ministry of Labor, Isa Town, June 8, 2010.
Ibid.; Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection
Society Executive Committee, February 27, 2012.
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, May 23, 2012.
Human Rights Watch Interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, head of the Department of
Inspections, Ministry of Labor, Isa Town, February 4, 2010; Human Rights Watch
interview with then Minister of Labor, Majeed Al Alawi, Isa Town, February 4,
2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with then Minister of Labor, Majeed Al Alawi, Isa
Town, February 4, 2010; Begena Pradeep, “Sungwon workers lodge complaint
over payment,” Gulf Daily News, February 25, 2010,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=271605 (accessed July
15, 2010).
Human Rights Watch interview with then Minister of Labor, Majeed Al Alawi, Isa
Town, February 4, 2010; Begena Pradeep, “Wages row resolved,” Gulf
Daily News, April 2, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Marietta Dias, Migrant Workers Protection
Society, Manama, January 24, 2010.
Aniqa Haider, “70 Workers in Wage Appeal,” Gulf Daily News,
September 8, 2011, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=313111
(accessed March 2, 2012); Aniqa Haider, “Workers Demand Wages,” Gulf
Daily News, November 16, 2011,
http://www2.gulfinthemedia.com/index.php?m=politics&id=580223&lim=120&lang=en&tblpost=2011_11
(accessed March 2, 2012).
Aniqa Haider, “Contracting Firm Workers Call Off Strike,” Gulf
Daily News, November 23, 2011, https://www.menafn.com/qn_news_story.asp?storyid={e771cefd-5664-4835-8d6d-6d8072e4bfff}(accessed
March 2, 2012).
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, February 27, 2012.
Human Rights Watch interview with Marietta Dais, Migrant Workers Protection
Society, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, February 27, 2012.
Response of Muhammad Iqbal, managing director, the Senior Group of Companies,
August 8, 2012, on file with Human Rights Watch and reproduced in the
appendices to this report available on the Web version:
http://www.hrw.org/node/110207/
Response to a Human Rights Watch request for updates from the Ministry of
Social Development to Human Rights Watch, May 28, 2012. On file with Human
Rights Watch.
Human Rights Watch Interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, head of the Department of
Inspections, Ministry of Labor, Isa Town, February 4, 2010; Human Rights Watch
Interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, head of the Department of Inspections, Ministry
of Labor, Isa Town, June 8, 2010.
Response
to a Human Rights Watch request for statistical data from the Ministry of Labor
to Human Rights Watch, June 11, 2010. On file with Human Rights Watch.
Human
Rights Watch interview with social worker, name withheld on request, Manama,
February 4, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Nadia Khalil al-Qaheri, head of the Labor
Complaints Section at the Ministry of Labor, Isa Town, February 4, 2010.
Response to a Human Rights Watch request for statistical data from the Ministry
of Labor to Human Rights Watch, June 11, 2010. On file with Human Rights Watch;
Response to a Human Rights Watch request for updates from the Ministry of
Social Development to Human Rights Watch, May 28, 2012. On file with Human
Rights Watch. NOTE: Numbers excluded domestic workers. 2011 is the first year
since 2008, which is the earliest year Human Rights Watch has data for, in
which the number of Bahraini citizens whose complaints were sent to labor court
out numbered those resolved by the Ministry of Labor’s mediation. That
year also marked a significant spike in labor complaints filed by Bahraini
citizens, with 1,600 more complaints than the pervious year. According to the
International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) “between 2,600 and 3,500
workers in both the public and private sectors were dismissed for their alleged
involvement in the protests of 2011.” Human Rights Watch was unable to
confirm whether the spike in worker complaints and increased rate of complaints
sent to court was due to the dismissals reported by the ITUC. See Annual Survey
of Violations of Trade Union Rights, Bahrain-2012, International Trade Union
Confederation, June 6, 2012, http://survey.ituc-csi.org/Bahrain#tabs-1
(accessed June 24, 2012).
Ibid.
Note: Numbers excluded domestic workers.
Ibid.
Note: Numbers excluded domestic workers.
Ibid.
Note: Numbers excluded domestic workers.
Ibid. Note: Numbers excluded domestic workers.
Ibid. Note: Numbers excluded domestic workers.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Nadia Khalil al-Qaheri, head of the Labor
Complaints Section at the Ministry of Labor, Isa Town June 8, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch email correspondence with Beverley Hamadeh, Migrant Workers
Protection Society, June 7, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Nadia Khalil al-Qaheri, head of the Labor
Complaints Section at the Ministry of Labor, Isa Town, February 4, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch email correspondence with Beverley Hamadeh, Migrant Workers
Protection Society, June 7, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Noora Feleyfel, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Manama, June 6, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Ghada Sulaibeekh, attorney, Manama, February 3,
2010.
Bahrain
Labor Law for the Private Sector, No. 23 of 1976, art. 155. In some cases if a worker
loses their claim courts will saddle them with their employer’s legal
costs.
Ibid. In 2006, under Decree No. 29 (2005) with respect to the Re-Organization
of the Ministry of Social Affairs, the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs
became two ministries – the Ministry of Labor, and the Ministry of Social
Development. The Ministry of Labor is the agency charged with enforcing the
labor law.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Ghada Sulaibeekh, attorney, Manama, February 3,
2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Nadia Khalil al-Qaheri, head of the Labor
Complaints Section at the Ministry of Labor, Isa Town, February 4, 2010.
Ibid;
Human Rights Watch interview with attorney, Maha Jaber, Manama, February 1,
2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Pambagal Siradas Rathnaprakash, Manama, January 30,
2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Marietta Dias, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Manama, January 24, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Pambagal Siradas Rathnaprakash, Manama, January 30,
2010.
Human
Rights Watch phone interview Marietta Dias, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
August 3, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview Marietta Dias, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with social worker, name withheld on request,
Manama, February 5, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch email correspondence with Beverley Hamadeh, Migrant Workers
Protection Society, Manama, June 7, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Lateesh Bharathan, paralegal, Manama, February 1,
2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Maha Jaber, labor attorney, Manama, February 1,
2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Maha Jaber, labor attorney, Manama, February
1, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Ali Radhi, then Chief executive officer, LMRA,
Manama, February 2, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Maha Jaber, attorney, and Lateesh Bharathan,
paralegal, Manama, February 1, 2010; Human Rights Watch group interview with
the Migrant Workers Protection Society Action Committee, Manama, January 28,
2010.
Human Rights Watch group interview with the Migrant Workers Protection
Society’s Action Committee, Manama, January 28, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Shaikh Khalid bin Ali Al Khalifa, minister of
Justice and Islamic Affairs, Manama, February 3, 2010.
Bahrain
Penal Code and its Amendments, No. 15 of 1976, art. 302, as amended by
Legislative decree No. 6 of 1993, art. 2.
Bahrain
Penal Code and its Amendments, No. 15 of 1976, 270 arts. 336-348.
Law
No. 1 (2008) with Respect to Trafficking in Persons.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Abd al-Wahab Rashid, Ministry of Interior, Manama,
February 2, 2010.
Human Rights Watch interview with Ali Al Buainian, attorney general, Public
Prosecution Office, Manama, February 3, 2010.
Response of the Government of Bahrain to Human Rights Watch’s written
inquiry of September 9, 2010, on file with Human Rights Watch. Penal Code
Article 389 states that “Any person who acquires with the use of force or
threat a document, a signature thereon, an amendment thereof or causes
cancellation or a prison sentence unless a severer penalty is provided
for.” Bahrain’s anti-human trafficking law makes no direct reference
to passports or documents; instead it criminalizes exploitative labor, forced
labor, and similar conditions.
United States Department of State, “2011 Trafficking in Persons Report:
Bahrain,” June 2011, www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2011 (accessed February
13, 2012).
Aniqa Haider “Prison term for sponsor’s wife is welcomed,” Gulf
Daily News, December 2, 2011,
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=292952
(accessed May 1, 2012).
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, May 23, 2012.
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Liz Szalay, Migrant Workers
Protection Society Action Committee, June 2, 2010.
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Liz Szalay, Migrant Workers
Protection Society Action Committee, January 24, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Noora Feleyfel, Migrant Workers Protection Society,
Manama, June 6, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch email correspondence with Noora Feleyfel, Migrant Workers
Protection Society, Manama, January 23, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch interview with Maha Jaber, Manama, February 1, 2010.
Bahrain
Penal Code and its Amendments, No. 15 of 1976, art. 302, as amended by
Legislative decree No. 6 of 1993, art. 2; Human Rights Watch interview with Ali
Al Buainian, attorney general and representative of the Public Prosecution
Office, February 3, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch group interview with Ali Al Buainian, attorney general and representative
of the Public Prosecution Office, February 3, 2010.
Human
Rights Watch group interview with Brig. Tariq bin Dina, undersecretary, Bahrain
Ministry of Interior and representatives of the Ministry of Interior, Manama,
February 2, 2010.
Decree
of the Attorney General number (2 ) of 2010, On the Issue of Investigation the
Crimes of Forced Labor.
United
Nations Development Programme, Kingdom of Bahrain, Foreign Workers and Labor
Conditions in Bahrain, November 2010.
“ILO: New Landmark Treaty to Protect Domestic Workers,” Human
Rights Watch, June 16, 2011,
http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/06/16/ilo-new-landmark-treaty-protect-domestic-workers
(accessed February 21, 2012).
United Nations Development Programme, Kingdom of Bahrain, Foreign Workers and
Labor Conditions in Bahrain, November 2010.
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, February 27, 2012.
Human
Rights Watch Interview with Ahmed Alhaiki, Manama, February 4, 2010.
United Nations Development Programme, Kingdom of Bahrain, Foreign Workers and
Labor Conditions in Bahrain, November 2010.
Human Rights Watch email correspondence with Migrant Workers Protection Society
Executive Committee, February 27, 2012.
Ibid.; United States Department of State, “2011 Trafficking in Persons
Report: Bahrain,” June 2011, www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2011
(accessed February 13, 2012).
United Nations Development Programme, Kingdom of Bahrain, Foreign Workers and
Labor Conditions in Bahrain, November 2010.
“ILO: New Landmark Treaty to Protect Domestic Workers,” Human
Rights Watch, June 16, 2011,
http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/06/16/ilo-new-landmark-treaty-protect-domestic-workers
(accessed February 21, 2012).
Human Rights Watch interview with Daoud, Manama, March 23, 2011.
Human Rights Watch interview with Abdul M, Manama, April 2, 2011.
Human Rights Watch interview with Shehbaz, Manama, March 23, 2011.
The CPR (Central Population Registry) is the national identification card
issued by the Central Informatics Organization, the government agency responsible
for assigning identification numbers for all Bahrainis and residents in the
country.
Human Rights Watch interview with Babar, Manama, March 23, 2011.
Human Rights Watch interview with unidentified Pakistani laborer, Manama, April
2, 2011.
Human Rights Watch interview with Mohammed E, Manama, March 23, 2011.
See http://bna.bh/portal/en/news/475143?date=2011-10-4. As of mid-September
2012, their case under review by an appellate civilian court. According to one
of the lawyers in the case, the accused were charged under the
counter-terrorism law as well as penal code articles. Sayed told Human Rights
Watch that there are several inconsistencies with the prosecution’s case,
including a lack of clarity regarding where the attack against Abdul Malik took
place. Many of the defendants alleged they had been subjected to torture to
elicit confessions. Human Rights Watch has documented the systematic violations
of international fair trial standards by the special military courts as well as
ordinary civilian courts in highly politicized cases (see No Justice
http://www.hrw.org/reports/2012/02/28/no-justice-bahrain. As this report went
to press the next hearing in the appeal court review of these convictions was
scheduled for July 9, 2012.
BICI report. at para 1512. According to the International Trade Union
Confederation (ITUC), commenting on attacks against migrant workers in Bahrain
in its 2012 Annual Survey of Violations of Trade Union Rights,
“Since 17 March [2011], eight migrant workers have died and approximately
88 sustained various injuries. Ten Pakistanis are in critical condition.”
See http://survey.ituc-csi.org/Bahrain (accessed June 13, 2012). It appears
that this casualty toll includes migrant workers killed or injured in incidents
unrelated to Bahrain’s political unrest.
Ibid. at 882 and 883;
http://www.migrant-rights.org/2011/06/29/bahrain-further-restricts-migrant-rights-while-publicly-expressing-concern-for-migrants/
Sandeep Singh Grewal, “200 Attacks!” Gulf Daily News, March
5, 2012, http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=325106 (citing
a figure released by Bahrain Human Rights Watch Society, a group not affiliated
with Human Rights Watch).
International
Labour Organization, Declaration of Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work,
http://www.ilo.org/dyn/declaris/DECLARATIONWEB.static_jump?var_language=EN&var_pagename=DECLARATIONTEXT
(accessed August 10, 2006).
“ILO: New Landmark Treaty to Protect Domestic Workers,” Human
Rights Watch, June 16, 2011,
http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/06/16/ilo-new-landmark-treaty-protect-domestic-workers
(accessed February 21, 2012); United Nations Development Programme, Kingdom of
Bahrain, Foreign Workers and Labor Conditions in Bahrain, December 10, 2010.
citizens (Sixty-fourth session, 2004), U.N. Doc.
CERD/C/64/Misc.11/rev.3 (2004),
International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), adopted December 16, 1966, G.A.
Res. 2200A (XXI), 21 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 16) at 12.
The
Position of Aliens Under the Covenantrestrictions
to free movement “provided by law, are necessary to protect national
security, public order (ordre public), public health or morals or the rights
and freedoms of others, and are consistent with the other rights recognized in
the present Covenant.”
Freedom
of movement (Art.12)
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), adopted December
16, 1966, G.A. Res. 2200A (XXI), 21 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 16) at 52, U.N. Doc.
A/6316 (1966), 999 U.N.T.S. 171, entered into force March 23, 1976, art. 7; and
Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or
Punishment, adopted December 10, 1984, G.A. res. 39/46, annex, 39 U.N. GAOR
Supp. (No. 51) at 197, U.N. Doc. A/39/51 (1984), entered into force June 26,
1987, art 16.
Committee
Against Torture, General Comment 2, Implementation of Article 2 by States
Parties, U.N. Doc. CAT/C/GC/2 (2008), para. 18.
Human
Rights Committee, General Comment 32, Right to Equality Before Courts and
Tribunals and to a Fair Trial, U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/GC/32 (2007), para. 27.
See United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC), Resolution 8/7, “Mandate
of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on the issue of human
rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises,”
June 18, 2008; and HRC, Resolution A/HRC/17/L.17/Rev.1, “Human rights and
transnational corporations and other business enterprises,” June 16,2011.
Special Representative of the Secretary-General on the issue of human rights
and transnational corporations and other business enterprises, “Protect,
Respect and Remedy: a Framework for Business and Human Rights,” UN
document A/HRC/8/5, April 7, 2008; and Special Representative of the
Secretary-General on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations
and other business enterprises, “Guiding Principles on Business and Human
Rights: Implementing the United Nations ‘Protect, Respect and Remedy’ Framework,”
UN document A/HRC/17/31, March 21, 2011.
