AJAD Facilities Management LLC[i], based in Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates, is avoiding paying some of its workers. Its website lauds the careers that people can have with their company, but this just hides the dark truth of the exploitation that many can suffer in the UAE.
With reported revenue of approximately $5 million[ii] USD per year it is well within their capability to pay loyal, respectful, and hardworking employees. However, the reality is that vulnerable migrant workers have been ignored. One such case is that of Bashir Katende.
Bashir is one of the victims of unethical state business practices in the United Arab Emirates which inflicted horrific abuse upon black African migrant workers in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).[iii] Click here to view the full report, exposing the abuse and how the UAE authorities detained, tortured, and deported over 800 workers. Without warning, or any kind of due process, Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) police raided five residential buildings in Abu Dhabi. Guest workers were dragged from their loggings at night, imprisoned, racially and sexually abused, and then deported without them being properly paid. Many are still being denied remuneration owed to them from many months of work. For his employ to continue evading paying Bashir his wages is just compounding and continuing the abuse. If this can happen to a skilled worker, a talented electrician, such as Bashir then it can happen to anyone.
In London, where ImpACT International are based, the city celebrates Christmas. Yet many in Britain do not realise that companies such as AJAD Facilities Management are reneging on their contractual obligations to pay their workers who have been exploited in the apartheid state that is the United Arab Emirates.
- Robert Oulds, Executive Director of ImpACT International
Despite his many pleas on behalf of his family, which do not always get the courtesy of even a reply, his now former employer, AJAD Facilities Management, have still not paid him. Bashir is still owed 5,600 AED, dirham, which is more than £1,100 GBP, a considerable sum in his home country of Uganda to which he was deported under extreme and sudden circumstances. After many months he is still waiting for AJAD to honour their debts to him. He has been placed into a Catch 22 position where the company are refusing to pay him until such time as he produces a police report on his deportation, yet he cannot obtain one from outside of the UAE. He is unable to return and without the funds to do even if he could. He is not alone.
ImpACT International has the employment contract between AJAD Facilities Management and Mr Bashir Katende of Uganda. This is signed by Mr Nasser Al Suwaidl, AJAD’s CEO and Founder. Furthermore, the legally binding contract has been stamped by the company. ImpACT also have copies of the communications between Bashir and AJAD.
Robert Oulds, Executive Director of ImpACT International states, “In London, where ImpACT International are based, the city celebrates Christmas. Yet many in Britain do not realise that companies such as AJAD Facilities Management are reneging on their contractual obligations to pay their workers who have been exploited in the apartheid state that is the United Arab Emirates. That country has an appalling human rights record, uses spyware and censorship to persecute human rights activists and uses state security services to harass, imprison, and defraud black people in the emirate.
“The Katende family were relying on the wages that he is owed to support them. He and his wife and children will go without this Christmas. It is a scandal that the UAE has been allowed to literally abuse people helping their country. AJAD Facilities Management must be made to act. Bashir’s suffering must not be in vain.”
ImpACT International calls on AJAD to pay their workers’ outstanding wages including their overtime pay.
- Companies in the UAE must honour their debts:
- AJAD must without further delay pay the monies owed to former and current employees working for that firm.
- The lateness warrants that the level of outstanding payment to former employees must include interest at 4 percent above the base rate of the Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates.
- Reform:
- An injury must be held, overseen by observers from the International Labour Organisation, to find out why AJAD has been avoiding paying its former workers for so long.
- Those responsible should be held accountable.
- AJAD Facilities Management should be blacklisted from being able to win all government contracts until such time as they properly remunerate those that have been in its employment.