Camp conditions in Bahrain questioned

Workers in the Diraz camp earn around US $159 (BHD60) a month, the standard wage for unskilled labourer in Bahrain. For this they work seven days a we

The plan works in theory, but in reality many camps are never registered and other employers simply tell workers to find their own accommodation with limited wages.

The Ministry of Labour’s head of occupational health and safety, Ali Abdulla Makki, concedes it’s a big problem, but not his.

“You will find these cases everywhere in Bahrain with around 30 labourers living in one small house, 10 to 15 people to a room,” he says.

Story continues below

Advertisement

FEATURED COMMENT Please click here to comment on this article

“None of these camps are registered and in many cases the employer gives workers an extra US $26.50 (BHD10) a month to find their own house.

“How can we get records of such cases? These are generally camps in old houses within Manama and Muharraq and it is up to the municipalities to control this.

“We don’t have the manpower, but by certain procedures the municipalities can control it and arrange building inspections or report it to us.”

But the municipalities tell a different story. Jassim Redha Hussain council secretary for Manama Municipality says their inspections only relate to things like the building’s structural integrity but not the “standard of living factors” specified for labour camps.

“There could be 100 people living in a room and if the building complies with our codes then there’s nothing we can do. We know where the camps are. We have a full survey of Manama and know every house which was rented to construction workers in 2008,” he explains.

“But when we say this to the Labour Ministry they say ‘it is not our job, we are in charge of the registered labour camps, not houses’. So it’s nobody’s job. There is a gap in the laws.”

In reality it seems the problem is actually far too big for the ministry or the municipalities to handle alone.
 

If either of them were to start wide-scale enforcement of the law by evicting labourers and demolishing derelict camps, thousands of workers would have nowhere to live – an economic and social disaster.

Simply put, there is currently nowhere else for the workers to go and only the upper echelons of the Bahraini government can solve that problem.