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Editorial: West Caicos hostage situation opens a Pandora's Box of issues
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| Published on Friday, October 24, 2008 |
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Though the release of the Israeli hostages, who were held by Chinese workers on the small island of West Caicos, brought relief that the situation was resolved without physical injury to either the hostages or their captors, it now shines a spotlight on a much larger issue.
What drove the Chinese workers to go to such extreme measures as to hold human lives hostage? And for the government of the Turks and Caicos Islands, who assured the world that there was “no hostage situation,” let us clarify the definition of hostage: ‘…a person given or held as security for the fulfillment of certain conditions or terms, promises, etc., by another…’
The Israelis (persons held) were being held against their will by force, which included knives and verbal threats of harm to their lives: by the Chinese (by another); as security for payment of unpaid wages (certain conditions, terms, or promises) by their employer. We would say that the situation fit the full definition of “hostage”.
Furthermore, the claimed non-hostage situation was eventually resolved under the supervision of an armoured vehicle sent to West Caicos on a barge by the TCI government. A strange way to deal with a non-threatening situation as claimed.
Were the Chinese workers protesting merely the fact that they were owed back wages? The likelihood of that being the sole contributing factor is very slim. We may need to take a much closer look into the arrangement that ultimately brought them to the Turks and Caicos to work, and who the arrangement benefitted.
The issue of importing foreign workers to perform contract labour in the TCI has been a source of contention for quite a while because it leaves local residents without jobs, and in a virtual unemployment lockdown, as available positions are given to foreigners who will work for pennies on the dollar. Those “pennies” are paid to accounts in the workers’ origin country instead of being circulated in the TCI to strengthen the struggling economy.
This presents an even bigger concern, a Pandora’s Box of issues relating to labour importing arises, and questions need to be asked. Do we have the fortitude to open the box and peer inside?
With the revelation that each of the Chinese workers had to pay a $15,000 fee before being brought to the TCI to work, and then reportedly earning a meagre $1,000 a month salary, one has to ask, “Are the foreign workers being imported as a form of human slavery or slave labour?”
The definition of human trafficking is partially given as the recruitment, transportation, harbouring, or receipt of people for the purposes of forced labour, including, but not limited to, bonded labour or debt bondage, and slavery or practices similar to slavery. Is this what is going on in the TCI?
Reportedly, the living conditions for the Chinese workers were less than civilised, consisting of only ragged tents to shelter them from the weather, basic latrine facilities, and the barest of necessities available to them. These conditions were supposedly “upgraded” after the workers complained publicly about their living conditions.
Why would anyone “agree” to pay more than their annual salary for the privilege of working in squalid conditions? It can only be assumed that it wasn’t a choice made under normal circumstances.
Where, exactly, did the accumulated $4.5 million go? Who is reaping the financial benefits of this type of arrangement? It most certainly is not the individuals performing the labour.
Unconfirmed reports claim that at least one of the labour contracting companies is owned by a Progressive National Party (PNP) member of parliament, which in no way would surprise anyone who has kept abreast of the questionable activities taking place in this beautiful country.
The estimated global annual revenue for human trafficking is between $5 billion and $9 billion; with a global annual market of $42.5 billion – enough zeros to attract unscrupulous businessmen and corrupt politicians everywhere.
Given that the Commission of Inquiry was appointed to look into possible corruption or other serious dishonesty in recent years, on the part of past and present elected members of the legislature, this could very well be a useful line of investigation for the Commission to pursue. | | | | Reads : 1888 |
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