Workers’ rights and football collide in Qatar
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This week, how the 2022 World Cup in Qatar is bringing workers' rights in the Gulf into focus; returning embezzled money is great, but what else needs to be done?
THE BEAUTIFUL GAME
There was exciting news in English football this week where mega-club and would-be European Super League participants Chelsea (owner’s net worth: a vast $15.5 billion) lost to minnows Leicester City (owner’s net worth: a mere $3.7 billion) in the FA Cup Final (sponsored by UAE-owned airline Emirates). It’s a tale to warm the heart of every sporting underdog out there — you too can defeat a billionaire-backed sporting giant, as long as you’re also backed by a billionaire.
The news from Qatar, which will host the World Cup next year, is grim, however. Football’s governing body and the Qatari authorities have both pledged that the tournament has helped improve workers’ rights in the kingdom as a “catalyst for broader positive social change”. However, the fate of Malcolm Bidali suggests otherwise.
Bidali, a Kenyan who came to Qatar to work as a security guard, has been documenting his experience as a migrant laborer in a series of blog posts.
- “Six people in one room seems tolerable if you compare it to those sleeping eight in a room. I personally have been a guest of such hospitality. It was dehumanizing. I have also peeked into certain rooms, belonging to different companies, that carried a similar number, albeit with deplorable hygienic conditions. I remember feeling a blend of emotions. First was disgust at the state my eyes beheld. Second was pity for the inhabitants. Third was appreciation for the better conditions on our side. Fourth was confusion over how and why such a thing happened. Fifth was ire. Sixth was melancholy,” he wrote, in May last year.
He also shared the experiences of his fellow laborers on Twitter, on Instagram, and in lengthier posts on Medium.
- “I suppose I’m just frustrated, more than usual, at how the very people with the responsibility to look after our welfare are complicit in our misfortune, AND how they manage to get away with it every time, all while being celebrated members of society,” he wrote in March after an encounter with literal royalty.
In late April, Bidali spoke to a group of civil society organizations and trade unions about his experience working in Qatar. Shortly afterwards, on May 4, state security service agents came to his accommodation and detained him. He has not been heard from since. According to a joint statement from five human rights organizations, Qatari authorities say he is under investigation for violating security regulations.