RIYADH: The Riyadh governorate has instructed local police to expedite the case of 45 stranded workers who claim they have not been paid their wages for seven months. They are demanding that their case be reviewed and that they be paid their dues and provided plane tickets home in accordance with the law.
“The Riyadh governorate has asked the Sulaimaniya police to help solve the eight-month-old case,” said Abid Lateef Khan, a Pakistani medical technician who is one of the victims.
A total of 55 workers — recruited by the Nukhba House of Medical Services mainly from India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka — were stranded after the company flouted the terms of the contracts they had signed in the respective countries.
“Ten workers have left the Kingdom since then,” said Khan.
“But the remaining workers are suffering from hunger and depression,” said another worker, adding that the men have visited the Sulaimaniya police station several times in search of an immediate solution.
In a complaint to the Ministry of Labor, the workers alleged that the company required them to work an extra year after their contracts expired, failed to pay for their tickets home, retained up to seven months’ wages and did not approve exit visas.
Labor Ministry officials told them they had to wait two weeks for a response from the employer. When the company failed to reply, the ministry office sent the workers to the local labor court, but the court scheduled proceedings for July, leaving the workers without legal status or pay.
“The problems are getting compounded and no government agency is coming to our rescue,” said Gagan Kumar Singh, who has not been paid a single riyal for six months.
He called on embassy officials to intervene in the matter. Many workers have complained that their residence permits have expired. In some cases, exit visas have also lapsed.
After contracts of some of the workers expired in December 2006, hospitals where they worked refused to release them until the company gave them replacements.
In January when the Ministry of Health workers replaced the contract workers from Nukhba, the company moved the workers to an apartment in Riyadh where they have been living in miserable conditions since. Because the company has not renewed the workers’ residency permits, they risk arrest and deportation if they venture out of their camp. Only a handful of them have residency papers that are still valid.
“Yesterday, despite the risk of arrest, we went to the Sulaimaniya police station, but nothing happened,” said one worker. Arab News tried to contact Nukhba management, but they did not answer phone calls.
Medical professionals in the group were earning between $350 and $400 a month. Cleaners were earning less than $100. The workers are also seeking their end-of-service entitlements under the law.
This is not the first time that the Nukhba House is in the news. This company has been blacklisted for their failure to honor terms of employment contracts in another case.
In another case recently the company was accused of holding back a number nurses under its sponsorship after the expiry of their contracts. The nurses were placed in hospitals run by the Ministry of Health in Rumah, Tumair, Sajer and Al-Nafy. At the time, the company cited the extension of its contracts with the ministry as the reason for the move.
