Qatar and FIFA try to change the Cup’s image after reports of exploitation

After playing aloud with president Jair Bolsonaro and his entourage on the lawn of the Lusail stadium, stage of the final of the Qatar Cup, FIFA president Gianni Infantino gathered a group of workers on the grandiose construction site for a photo. They all posed smiling and giving the thumbs up.

The gesture, in front of the press, was an attempt to turn the page from one of the most compromising episodes of recent years to the image of the ultimate football entity.

Since the works linked to the 2022 World Cup began, about ten years ago, allegations of abuse and slave labor, which would have even led to deaths, have accumulated in reports and reports by human rights organizations.

To journalists shortly after the event, the official asked that the effort to improve the situation be valued.

“We have to recognize the work that has been done to protect and improve workers’ rights in recent years. Qatar today is really an example,” said Infantino, for whom the event’s window itself contributed to the advances.

“This progress would not have been possible without the World Cup spotlight. Let’s look at the positives,” he said.

He acknowledged, however, that the situation is still not ideal. “More can always be done.”

Exactly one year before the start of the World Cup, Qatar is a huge construction site, with countless workers painting the landscape with their yellow and orange fluorescent vests.

Although the pace of work is considered satisfactory and there is no prospect of delays, there is still a lot to be completed.

Lusail, home to the stadium Bolsonaro visited, is a new city that is being built entirely from scratch and still has a dystopian look, with modern buildings appearing amidst a desert landscape.

The eight stadiums that will host the World Cup are practically completed. Some just need finishing touches or work on the surroundings.

In downtown Doha, heavy traffic is hampered by the construction of traffic corridors, and an extensive project redoes the seafront avenue, which will give rise to the biggest “fan fest” in the history of the World Cups, with almost 10 km in length.

In these beds, very little Arabic, the official language of Qatar, is spoken. English with an African accent, or languages ​​from South Asian countries, is far more common.

This is because almost all those responsible for heavy work are people who arrive in the country for temporary contracts, a common scenario in the Persian Gulf emirate for decades.

Of the 2.5 million inhabitants of Qatar, only 10% are citizens of the country. The rest are made up of legions of migrant workers, who until 2016 were hired following a model called kafala.

The system linked workers to the employers responsible for bringing them into the country, in a regime considered to be semi-slavery.

After intense international and FIFA pressure, reforms began to be made in the last five years. The main one was the end of the requirement that the employer authorize the worker to leave the country before the end of the contract. It is now prohibited for the employer to retain the employee’s passport.

It is also easier to have job changes, rather than an impossibility. New regulations also seek to improve unhealthy working conditions, especially in summer, when the temperature can reach 50°C.

Workers with whom to sheet spoke recognize advances, but disagree with Infantino’s assessment that Qatar would be an “example”.

Ugandan Frank Agonza, 30, arrived in Doha for a four-month contract, brought in by a company that does the job of recruiting workers in his country. Last Thursday (18th), he and a Kenyan colleague were doing cleaning work at the Ras Abu Aboud stadium, one of the new World Cup arenas, which is more than 90% complete.

“Here, at least, there is work,” says he, who made a living doing sporadic work for mining companies in Uganda. “I wouldn’t say life here is good, but it’s better than in my country,” he says.

Agonza works from 7:00 am to 4:00 pm building the stadium and receives a base salary of 1,300 rials, or about US$370 (R$2,000 at current exchange rates). Almost all the income is sent home, where he left behind a six-year-old daughter.

Living conditions are spartan. He sleeps in a room with three other people. “We only have a curtain separating our beds,” he says. Even so, he wants to extend the bond after his contract ends. He dreams of spending at least two years in Qatar, working on other projects after the World Cup.

A few kilometers away, the work pace is intense on the Corniche, the city’s sprawling shore. Little by little, the scenario is gaining the face of the Worlds. In a square, 32 flags with the Cup brand are hoisted and are replaced by countries’ flags as the teams qualify – the most recent was Argentina’s, on Wednesday (17).

Hundreds of workers lay tiles on the ground, pave streets and apply artificial grass at the site, which should be one of the most frequented by fans during the event. The work continues even in the 30ºC of Qatari autumn, a temperature considered mild in the country.

But in the summer months, new legislation requires service to be stopped in the middle of the day.

“Now it’s easy,” says Jamal, who hails from Jordan and oversees the crane operation. “In the months of July, August and September, we stop from 12:00 to 15:00”.

At the Corniche construction site, most workers come from countries such as India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal. Virtually everyone has masks due to the pandemic, although many do not. “In September [de 2022] everything will be ready,” said a worker in the Tamil region of southern India.

To try to improve the image of the works, the Ministry of Labor of Qatar created a section on its website dedicated to publicizing the reforms in the labor area.

In July, the ministry issued a decree with norms that in other countries would be considered usual, but which for the local reality are hailed as milestones.

One of them says that “the employer is obliged to issue a contract with the worker before his arrival in the country, under the same conditions that were accepted by the employee, in addition to providing accommodation and meals”.

Another item states that the employer’s rights expire if there is aggression against the employee or breach of previously established conditions.

The announced changes were praised by the International Labor Organization, which welcomed them “warmly”.

But they did not convince entities that denounce the ill-treatment of workers. One of the most influential, Human Rights Watch, called the reforms “disappointing.”

“Even if the Qatar government fully introduced the promised reforms, it would not mean the end of the exploitation system,” Hiba Zayadin, a researcher at the NGO, told the Associated Press.

According to her, workers are still legally tied to their employers and can be arrested and deported if they leave their jobs without permission.