Fighting Modern-Day Slavery: Save the Cleaners at A’Sharqiyah University in Oman

Fighting Modern-Day Slavery: Save the Cleaners at A’Sharqiyah University in Oman

“We will not rest until every little human being is free” – John Kani* CNN Freedom Project Published on March 14, 2019

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Ali Mansouri Writer, Researcher, Consultant #MyFreedomDay March 14 (This is a CNN Freedom Project dedicated to the global fight against modern-day slavery in all its forms and shapes including exploitation, abuse, forced labor, and human trafficking. People all over the globe join together to fight not only for their freedom but also for the freedom of their fellow human beings who have been deprived of their human freedom and dignity by greedy and wicked people. This is a global and noble fight organized by CNN – the voice of the people and one of the leading voices of humanity in our modern world.)

Introduction I still remember a video that went viral on June 2018. The video shows the Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte walking into the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport building in The Hague on Monday when he spilled his coffee. Instead of leaving it to the cleaners to do the cleaning, he reached for a mop and started cleaning the floor. As the uninformed cleaning staff saw what he was doing, they cheered and clapped, then helped him out when he could not work out how to use the mop. They were delighted that someone like the Prime Minister of the Netherlands was doing their cleaning job which they do every day though most people look at it as a “mean, manual, low-paid” job.

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The video of the Dutch leader using the mop to clean his spilled coffee spread quickly on social media, “with many readers in other countries voicing surprise that a world leader would take the time to clean up his own mess… The top comment on the story suggests that in some other countries, the reaction might have been to execute the coffee seller.” (Adam Taylor, Washington Post, June 6, 2018).

The video clearly indicates a sense of humanity for the cleaning job. There is nothing wrong with cleaning which is basically an essential activity for all civilized human beings, even for people who might be thought of as elite political leaders like Prime Ministers!

The workplace environment influences employees’ productivity, performance and well-being. No matter the industry, maintaining a clean workplace helps keep staff members safe, healthy and efficient.

While it may be tempting to put off dusting or other types of cleaning around the office or worksite, doing so may put employees at risk of suffering an injury or illness and will certainly reduce performance levels. Employees are thus greatly influenced by their workplace environment. A clean, hygienic workplace creates a good level of comfort in the employees. Keeping a workplace clean helps in creating an effective work environment.

Cleaning, especially in the commercial cleaning industry, is not a simple or an easy job as many people might think. It is a demanding, tiring job and can be very sophisticated in many cases. To do their job properly, professional cleaners need to have special qualities, practical experience and a number of skills: a reasonable level of fitness, punctual, reliable and trustworthy, ability to manage time effectively, ability to work both alone and in a team, awareness of health and safety procedures, reading skills for following instructions, knowledge of cleaning chemicals and supplies, Math skills for measuring cleaning fluids.

It is really very unfair then to look down on the job of the cleaners and pay them wages even below the national minimum wage. Most of the time, they are spoken to rudely by bad supervisors and bosses. They are not treated with appropriate dignity and respect. Many cleaners feel they are treated as being "invisible" and "the lowest of the low", and of being deprived of their basic human rights. They are subjected to exploitation and abuse and live in abject poverty; nothing short of slavery in its strict sense.

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We see and meet the cleaners every day when we come to work. Even if we do not see them or meet them, we notice whether they have visited our offices, classrooms, hallways or not. The first thing we notice when we come to office is whether the office has been cleaned or not. We feel very uncomfortable when we find out that our office has not been cleaned or has not been cleaned properly. The same thing applies to every place on the campus. Without the cleaners, we feel frustrated and uncomfortable.

Cleaners at A’Sharqiyah University In order to escape poverty and support their families back home, thousands of expatriate workers from mainly India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines migrate to Oman to work as cleaners in a large number of places including companies and higher education institutions.

In general, cleaners are not treated fairly and they live in very poor conditions almost everywhere in the world. But never have I seen cleaners living in virtual slavery as I have seen them at A’Sharqiyah University in Oman. Their conditions are really appalling and have been treated like “animals” by Abood Al-Sawafi (former VC) and Hamed Al-Hajri (Assistant VC).

All the cleaners at this university are very busy, but they are very unhappy, miserable, and depressed. You see them every day and everywhere from the very early morning until very late in the evening and even late at night. They never stop working, cleaning, and carrying furniture and things from one place to another! They do all the cleaning but they also do a lot of other odd jobs which have nothing to do with cleaning as per their work contract. It is obvious that they are being exploited and abused in violation of the Oman Labor Law and all ethical codes. They are being treated like slaves; they need to be set free! The cleaners feel absolutely powerless and unable to report the exploitation and the abuse being subjected to by Abood Al-Sawafi and Hamed Al-Hajri for fear of losing their jobs or going to jail. They are dying in silence. I will give some details here and call for a full investigation into the appalling and inhumane slavery conditions these cleaners live and work under at A’Sharqiyah University. This slavery should not be allowed to continue forever.

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Less than Minimum Wage The national minimum wage in Oman is 325 rials (one rial = 2.6 dollars) a month after an increase from 200 Omani rials by the Ministry of Manpower in 2013. This wage is hardly sufficient for one week due to inflation and the rising costs of living. Omanis earning the minimum wage are calling for the government to increase their wages to help them to survive: “I think it is time the government increases the minimum wage to a decent level, so we can look after our families properly,” said 27-year-old Raeed Al Balushi, who works at an electronics showroom. “It is too hard to live on 325 rials a month. You don’t get a lot these days for your shopping bag.” (The National, Oman, August 28, 2017). This is why some companies have decided to increase the minimum wage for their employees to 400 Omani rials: “The Directorate General of Manpower in Dhofar Governorate has signed an agreement with the Oman Gulf Company to raise the minimum wage for Omanis to RO 400 (i.e. more than one thousand dollars) starting from March this year. As per the agreement, the minimum salary of RO 400 will apply for both existing and incoming employees.” (Oman Observer, January 22, 2017).

Another company has gone even further and increased the minimum wage to OMR440: “The directorate of Manpower in Dhofar has signed an agreement to increase the minimum wage for Omanis in a company to OMR440.

In a statement, the Ministry of Manpower said: "The Directorate General of Manpower in Dhofar has signed an agreement to raise the minimum wage for Omanis working for ATW International for the management of beverages and food to OMR440, starting in January." (Times News Service, December 18, 2018) What about our cleaners at A’Sharqiyah University in Oman? How much do they get as a monthly wage? It is an incredibly low wage. They get 70 Omani rials (about $150) per month!

This means they get only a tiny fraction of the national minimum wage. How can they support themselves and their own families with this trivial amount of money?! To deprive the cleaners of the national minimum wage on the basis of their nationality is pure racism. They also have fathers, mothers, siblings to help in their home countries. So what do they do to survive?

Most of them cannot do anything partly because they are not legally allowed to take up another job to supplement their incomes and partly because of their excessive working hours at A’Sharqiyah university where they work from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. and oftentimes up to 10 p.m.! Few Page 5 of 11

of the cleaners do some odd jobs here and there outside the university campus, mostly on national days, for few dollars a month, but they cannot change their miserable situation drastically. This is why an increasing number of cleaners find no alternative but to escape from this servitude and augment the national crisis of absconding in Oman. Regrettably, Oman is the only country in the GCC bloc and one of the very few countries in the world which does not offer allowances to the employees’ wives and children – a serious flaw in Oman’s labor laws and its human rights records.

Excessive Working-Hours The number of working hours in the public sector in Oman is 6 hours, normally from 8 in the morning to 2 in the afternoon. In some public offices and institutions like colleges and universities, working hours are extended to 4 p.m., that is, the number of working hours is 8 hours. This is also the number of working hours in the private sector. The employees are financially compensated for these extended two hours. The number of work days is only 5 (Sunday-Thursday) with Friday and Saturday as off days. Let us keep these numbers in mind and compare them with the number of working hours and work days for the cleaners at A’Sharqiyah University. These very unfortunate and enslaved cleaners work from 7 in the early morning to 7 in the early afternoon, that is, they work for twelve hours per day! Some of them work until 9 or even 10 at night. There is no compensation of any sort whatsoever, financial or otherwise. You see the same cleaners working around the clock. This is clearly in violation of Article (68) of Oman Labor Law: Article (68): “An employee may not be required to work for more than nine hours a day and to a maximum of 45 hours a week with at least half an hour breaks for taking food and rest. The maximum work hours during Ramadan shall be six hours a day or 30 hours a week for Muslim employees. A decision by the Ministry may determine the timing of the work hours.”

The cleaners also work for 6 days a week. They are given only one day off (Friday) and are required to work on Saturday which is supposed to be an official day off. Again, they are not offered any compensation in return for working on Saturday.

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Toxic Work Environment Abood Al-Sawafi (former VC) and Hamed Al-Hajri (Assistant VC) are ruthless and merciless employers. They do not care about whether the work environment is toxic or not. All they care about is money and the profits they make to please the Board of Directors, the Board of Trustees, and the investors. For them, the end always justifies the means -- absolute Machiavellianism. It is therefore not a big surprise that the cleaners at the University work and live under very harsh and unhealthy conditions. Almost all the cleaners have pale faces and skinny bodies. It is very clear they do not have enough to feed themselves nor do they have proper healthcare.

The cleaners do not use gloves nor do they use protective clothes though they deal with chemicals and corrosive fluids. The stingy management led by Hamed Al-Hajri always refuses to spend anything on the cleaners. They live in cramped, run-down rooms in the slums district without hot water in winter and always with very little water; as water is a little expensive in the area where the University is located.

As per the Oman Labor Law, the employers should provide a suitable means of transport for their employees. Instead of doing this with the cleaners, Hamed Al-Hajri has provided them with old pickup trucks to transport them to and from the University even during the rainy and very cold periods of winter, and the sweltering lengthy summer months. You look at them shivering in winter and sweating in summer; these pickup trucks are usually used by the farmers in the area for the transport of their animals.

The cleaners look bewildered and miserable all the time. They hardly smile and they just want the day to go by without being punished by Hamed Al-Hajri. When you talk to them and ask them about their families back home, they start to cry. Most of them do not see their families for years in spite of the fact that the employers must provide an annual ticket for every expatriate worker as per the Oman Labor Law. Instead, the cleaners are promised a ticket for every two years but, as usual, Abood Al-Sawafi and Hamed Al-Hajri do not respect the law or the work contract and do not keep their promises.

In addition to cleaning, the cleaners at A’Sharqiyah University do a lot of other odd jobs which have nothing to do with cleaning in violation of their official work contract. They work as “porters” carrying books, furniture, and other things around the University.

There is a funny story to tell here. Hamed Al-Hajri has been brought up and lived in a Bedouin environment in the middle of the desert. In this environment, people are used to constantly Page 7 of 11

moving from one place to another looking for pasture for their goats, sheep, cattle, and camels.

So Hamed Al-Hajri has developed a “Bedouin mentality” which requires him to engage in changing places and moving things. He has been doing this at A’Sharqiyah University since he was appointed as an Assistant Vice Chancellor for Administration and Finance. He always changes offices, classrooms, break rooms, and other facilities. The poor cleaners are exploited and abused to work as porters carrying the furniture that go with these rooms and facilities.

Working as a porter has never been part of the job of the cleaners but the cleaners are scared to death to complain or protest for fear of losing their job or being severely punished by Hamed AlHajri. In many cases, the cleaners do not know their rights or how to challenge the mistreatment and abuse.

As their job designation suggests, they are cleaners at A’Sharqiyah University. So their job is restricted to the cleaning of the offices and the facilities on the campus. But Abood Al-Sawafi and Hamed Al-Hajri, being ruthless and merciless exploiters, have always forced the cleaners to wash their personal cars, the cars of other senior officers, and all the vehicles of the University.

You see the cleaners washing cars all the time even during lunch time when they are supposed to have lunch like other human beings at the University. This goes on all the year around including the freezing winter and the sweltering summer. It is a gross violation of Article (25) and Article (3B) of the Oman Labor Law: Article (25): “The employer shall not deviate from the terms of the contract or assign to the worker, a work that has not been agreed to, unless necessity so requires and on a temporary basis. Nevertheless, the employer may assign to the worker a work that has not been agreed to if it is not substantially different from the original work.”

Article (3B) “The employer has no right to impose any form of compulsory or coercive work.”

These are some shocking examples of exploitation, mistreatment, abuse, and forced labour facing the cleaners at A’Sharqiyah university in Oman. These certainly amount to modern-day

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slavery. Abood Al-Sawafi, Hamed Al-Hajri, HR Director and other wicked senior managers at the University should be held to account for enslaving their fellow human beings.

Kafala System: Slavery System The Kafala System in Oman and other GCC countries is an abhorrent system of slavery in every sense of the word. It is a remnant of the old system and practice of slavery in the Middle Ages, which is still found in some parts of these countries. This Kafala system ties the expatriate workers to their employers in the same way the old system of slavery used to tie slaves to their owners. It is disgusting and inhumane and we just do not understand how this system has persisted in the GCC countries in spite of the enormous pressures being put on these countries by the U.N, the Amnesty International, and other human rights organizations.

This Kafala system has always been described by human rights group as modern-day slavery.

The system places the work permit, the residence visa, and consequently the life and the job of the expatriate workers directly into the hands of the employers to whom this slavery system refers by using the term (Arbab ‫ )أرباب العمل‬in Arabic meaning “Gods of work” so your employer has become “your God”! What a disgusting use! This use reflects the immoral practice of slavery dating back to the pre-Islamic era in the Arab peninsula.

The Kafala system gives a blank check to the employers to mistreat, abuse, and enslave their employees the way they want, and to force them to work without rest, pay, or food.

Once an expatriate worker has escaped a ruthless, abusive employer like Abood Al-Sawafi and Hamed Al-Hajri, he will be reported to the police and public prosecutors; his personal photo and the details of his passport will be advertised on local newspapers as a worker who has “absconded”, an offense which almost always leads to jail. The exploited, abused, enslaved worker has now become a criminal! This is why the cleaners at A’Sharqiyah University find it extremely difficult to escape the “slavery cages” of Abood Al-Sawafi and Hamed Al-Hajri.

Those who manage to escape contribute to a national crisis in Oman; it is the crisis of absconding low-paid workers (virtually “slaves”): “Every year, the number of workers who are arrested for violating the labour system exceeds 20,000 cases, which is a tiring and costly figure to eliminate the absconding worker phenomenon,” added the Ministry of Manpower. (Times of Oman, October 31, 2017)

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(Read also my article: “Fighting Modern-Day Slavery: The No Objection Certificate in Oman”, published on LinkedIn on September 23, 2017).

Conclusions It is no excuse at all that these cleaners belong to a cleaning company or agency and any abuse or exploitation should be addressed to that company or agency and not to A’Sharqiyah University.

These cleaners work for A’Sharqiyah University and they are mistreated, abused, and enslaved

by A’Sharqiyah University’s bosses and senior managers who cannot avoid the legal, ethical, and moral responsibility of treating these cleaners as slaves.

These cleaners and other workers should be paid the national minimum wage and this wage should be raised from time to time to enable these low-paid workers to live a decent human life.

The Kafala system must be abolished as it is a slavery tool used by ruthless and wicked employers like Abood Al-Sawafi and Hamed Al-Hajri to exploit, abuse, and enslave the expatriate workers who cannot stand up to this exploitation, abuse, and slavery.

The Ministry of Manpower must ensure that the Oman Labor Law is respected and implemented in full at A’Sharqiyah University and elsewhere to safeguard the work and human rights of all expatriate workers in Oman.

Cleaners are human beings, exactly like all other human beings. There is no difference at all between the cleaners and other professional people. They are doing a great job for us. They are keeping our offices, classrooms, campuses, and everything else clean and hygienic. Without them, we simply cannot do our work. I, for one, cannot work in a dirty office or a dirty classroom or a dirty campus. The cleaners’ work is to be well-paid, appreciated and respected.

The relevant authorities in Oman should work together with Amnesty International and other human rights organizations and groups to immediately put an end to any exploitation, abuse, and forced labor the cleaners are subjected to at A’Sharqiyah University and other places.

On #MyFreedomDay March 14, we feel more inspired to fight not only for our freedom but also for the freedom of our fellow human beings who are mistreated and enslaved by ruthless and bad employers like Abood Al-Sawafi and Hamed Al-Hajri at A’Sharqiyah University and elsewhere.

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* Bonisile John Kani is a South African actor, director and playwright. He was born on 30 August 1943 in New Brighton, Port Elizabeth.

“Kani was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Durban-Westerville, the ‘Hiroshima Award for Peace’ (in 2000) and the Tribute Magazine’s ‘Titan of the Century’ award.

In 2005 he received the Olive Schreiner Prize and on 27 September 2005 Kani was awarded The Order of Ikhamanga in Silver by the South African Government for “Excellent contributions to theatre and, through this, the struggle for a non-racial, non-sexist and democratic South Africa”. In 2006 Kani was bestowed with an honorary doctorate by the University of Cape Town. Kani was honoured with a South African Film and Television Lifetime Achievement Award on 20 February 2010. Kani is currently an executive trustee of the Market Theatre Foundation, director of the Market Theatre Laboratory and chairman of the National Arts Council of South Africa.” (South African History Online)

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