Punishing times for daily wage labourers

Despite an overall increase in construction activity, life for daily wage labourers in Qatar is seeing further turmoil with business dipping and the temperature soaring.

These self-employed, often found in the Old Ghanim (Ghanim Al Atiq) area, rely on petty day-to-day jobs of plumbing, cementing, masonry, carpeting, cleaning and other such work.

“I first drove a six-wheeler for 15 months and then switched to doing this for a living,” a two-year resident from Pakistan said.

“It’s the freedom to decide work hours and the money involved that pushed me into this work. At the time friends said it’s easy money,” he said.

However, starting from QR2,000+ a month takings are down to QR1,500 and thereabouts, if “we are lucky”.

Workers, often runaways and from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Egypt, Sudan and other countries, gather on the streets of Old Ghanim as early as 5am looking out for approaching vehicles and potential customers.

Any vehicle passing the main street, is greeted by a mob, inquiring about the type of work, duration and the amount of cash.

“It is a lucky day when a Qatari family needs their home fixed and at least half a dozen of us get work early in the morning,” another freelance labourer who’s only been in Qatar a month said.

The hope game ends at noon though when most start to disappear into the shelter of a mosque or their bunked shanties.

Not all take every penny earned home though.

“I pay QR 1,000 for renewing my residence permit and another QR 1,000 to my sponsor on a yearly basis,” said another labourer, who has been doing it for 27 years.

According to him and others, some sponsors demand a share of the “profit” on a monthly or yearly basis, but many “don’t bother at all”.

His visa on the passport showed ‘driver’, while some others’ said their visa category displays ‘worker’.

Legally, the daily or hourly hiring has no mention in the Qatari labour law, Law No 14 of 2004.

An expatriate in this country can work only on a mutual understanding between him and his sponsor. This is technically known as a contract. Anyone working beyond the realms of a contract works illegally, the Labour Department has previously told Gulf Times.

However, scores of quasi-legal aliens, predominantly from South Asia and North Africa, have been available for years in the country as handymen without causing any major problems.

In case something goes wrong, the Labour Department said, the party that hires such workers will take the blame.

Photocaption: Labourers wait in Old Ghanim from dawn to noon hoping for a good day