Less than a year before the exciting World Cup Games, Qatar workers condition concerned human rights and worker rights groups. Qatar mostly used migrant workers in tough, sometimes deadly, conditions in stadium construction project during the past decade.
A new research by the International Labour Organization (ILO) revealed the country’s data gathering breaches. The ILO investigation of the migrant Qatar workers casualties also clarified the discrepancies in the approaches of classification of occurrences.
The ILO stated three days ago that it worked with major in agencies in Doha to compile a meticulous review of job accidents and fatalities last year. The institution, however, found flaws in report structures and models en route.
According to the ILO study, more than fifty Qatar workers lost their lives during their job in 2020 in Qatar. The study also explains that half a thousand more inflicted harsh injuries with another 37,600 going through mild injuries. “As a result, it is still not possible to present a categorical figure on the number of fatal occupational injuries in the country,” part of the ILO study explained.
The overwhelming group of workers who sustained on-work damages were from Nepal, India, and Bangladesh. “Falls from great heights and traffic accidents were the leading causes of serious injuries, followed by falling objects on construction sites,” the report continued.
Work circumstance for migrant Qatar workers has been a topic of discussion since the country took 2022 FIFA World Cup Games more than a decade ago. Qatari Labour Department commended the ILO study and said it was considering its suggestions.
“No other country has come so far on labour reform in such a short amount of time, but we acknowledge that there is more work to be done,” a statement by Qatari Labour Department explained hours after ILO report.
Qatar Workers condition; A Sad Story
The story of hazards, threats and tough condition for Qatar workers is a long story recurrently noted by international organizations. Qatar has usually tried to save face by respecting the findings and pledging to consider a reform in the condition.
The result, however, proved to be the deterioration of condition on a yearly basis. With the outbreak of covid-19 in 2020 and the acceleration of constructions after a halt, the circumstance was even harder.
The documents indicated a relationship between pre-mature mortality and dangerous working conditions in Qatar. Amnesty International used these documents to charge Qatar officials with neglecting to probe the worker casualties.
According to Amnesty International, Qatar regularly releases death records of migrant workers without completing thorough examinations. The country mostly puts the blame on accidents that are “natural causes” of deaths or loosely describes them heart failures.
Qatari administrations Communications Center dismissed Amnesty International’s results in August. Qatar’s “injury and mortality statistics are in line with international best practice and set new standards for the region,” the office claimed then.
The ILO urged in its study for an examination of the methods employed to examine fatalities of seemingly normal young workers from “natural causes.” ILO means to ascertain that whether these deaths were truly related to working condition or not based on a more accurate determination of the reasons.
This, it claims, would guarantee that Qatar workers receive proper compensation following workplace injuries. The group also asked for the creation of a national effective framework to aggregate credible information on occupational injuries.
The ILO finding clarifies that apart from casualties, the lack of transparency is a main challenge concerning Qatar workers condition. Qatar uses a vague and untrustworthy system to categorize the casualties, a way to contain the global pressure.
