Qatar recruitment and immigration firms dismiss labor report

Listen to this article

Doha, Qatar; – Some construction firms and consultants associated with building projects for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar are of the view that they are not being treated fairly by a handful of Labor Organizations claiming to represent workers rights.

Referring to a 2014 report by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) as an example, Ishman Rasheed, a recruitment consultant that is responsible for more than five thousand imported employees in Qatar, deems the report unfair.

“The ITUC report was one sided, and is only intended to make professionals like us, and even Qatar itself, looks bad,” said a seemingly upset Rasheed.

In his view, the report is nothing more than a PR stunt by the ITUC in its bid to create an “illusion” that it is actually representing workers rights.

Swamped by a series of scandals involving some of its directors, the world’s governing body for Football, FIFA, has also been struggling to address several media reports that continue to question the real labor circumstances of immigrants on FIFA 2022 projects in Qatar.

However, the private sector and most immigrant workers consultants are arguing against those reports, while claiming that it is nothing more than an international ploy to embarrass the Gulf States, particularly Qatar.

Efforts to solicit a comment from the ITUC regarding the “contentious” report prior to press time were unanswered.

 (Top photo by Amnesty International)