‘Our ordeal in Chinese firms’
By Sunday Oguntola 30/10/2011 00:00:00
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For many Nigerians, working with Chinese firms is as bad as living in hell, reports Sunday Oguntola

Juliet Ibeh sells not less than N250, 000 worth of clothes every day in China town. The booming business however has no direct bearing on her take-home. The Secondary school leaver earns a meagre N8, 000 monthly. She resumes 8.30 and closes 5.30pm everyday. She works except on Sundays.

According to her, ‘’This is not what anybody should be doing but what can I do? I have to make do with it. My boss talks to me anyhow but what can I do?’’

She is one of the poorly paid Nigerian workers in Chinese firms. But her condition is still better. In Ilupeju, a Chinese firm that manufactures cosmetics pays production staff only N6, 500k. Those who spoke with our correspondent painted gory details of maltreatment and poor working conditions.

‘’We resume 7am and close 6pm,’’ a lady in her 20s began. ‘’None of us is a staff. We are just casuals. We can come tomorrow and they will ask us to go. We observe only ten minutes of break after which we are ordered back to work. They say we are lazy and that is why Nigeria is not doing well.’’

Another staff said many male production workers have been incapacitated by accidents on the job without compensations. ‘’Just last week, someone lost his hand as he tried to work on a production machine. He was only given first aid after which he was dismissed without pay. We cannot protest because they will send us packing,’’ she lamented.

Another female worker complained of sexual harassment by the Chinese owners. ‘’If you want them to pay you well as a lady, then you have to be sleeping with them. Those of us who cannot do have remained at the same level for years. They are so crazy about sex that they can do anything to get it’’.　　　　

A Chinese plastic firm in Isolo Lagos is even worse. It employs mostly females for production activities. For toiling day and night, they get only N5,000. This is worsened by poor working conditions. A staff who spoke under strict anonymity said, ‘’our production hall is very stuffy. Many have collapsed from heat. You cannot complain because they will chase you out and somebody will take your place immediately’’.

In Abuja, Maaji Meriga almost lost his manhood early this year after he was assaulted by his Chinese boss. The 62-year-old casual worker and father of 6, was a water tanker driver for CCECC. While spraying the ground around Karamajiji village, near Abuja Airport, Meriga said another Chinese stopped him. He was asked to fill two drums with water instead.

Meriga obliged, turned off the main spray machine, opened the side tap and began filling the drums when Old Soldier came and queried him. Just then, CCECC’s transport manager, Marcho Chin, popularly called ‘old soldier’ confronted him.

"He said I am wasting resources that I wanted to spoil the tanker. I told him that I can’t spoil it. I told him that it is his brother that asked me to fill the drums.

‘’I bent down to switch off the spray machine when he then kicked me from behind on my scrotum and testes. I immediately fell down. As I got up and asked him ‘master why?’ he then blew me on the ear before entering his jeep and drove to the yard.’’

When Meriga reported to the company’s personnel manager, Mr. Austin, he was ordered out of the premises without any medical attention given to him. His testicle soon started swelling, leading to a surgery for which the company failed to be responsible. The Nigerian is still awaiting justice in his fatherland.

On February 5, 2010, another of the company’s water tanker drivers, Michael Francis, a casual staff for over a year, told ‘Old Soldier’ the pump of the tanker for wetting was faulty. He was asked to manage it. Hours later, the assistant transport manager, Mr. Lie, better known as Bedebede wanted to reduce his daily wage as the ground he was allotted was not properly wet.

　"He held my shirt, slapped and kicked me in the penis when I refused to give my wages card for him to cut some hours from the work I had done that day," said the 29-year-old.

"The pay is N600 a day and we can work from 7am to 5pm. I refused since it wasn’t my fault, because they can cut your money by half, then how much do I have left?"

Francis fainted on the spot and was hospitalised for over a week at Access Hospital located along Police Barracks Road, Gwagwa, Abuja.

President General of Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC), Peter Esele, recently lamented the maltreatment of Nigerians by Chinese firms.

He said, ‘’There are a lot of Chinese firms in Nigeria. One of our challenges is how to make the Chinese companies in Nigeria respect Nigerian law and workers’ rights.

‘’They must respect our labour laws and treat our workers well. We want to build a relationship that will benefit China and Nigeria.’’

Na today.
Come to think of it, is it by force to work for Chinese or Indian firms?
Just like police men that complain about their job everyday, am sure they know about the police job b4 they decided to take the job,
China and Indian companies are trash, only retarded and lazy fools would work for a Chinese firm. If you finally make up your mind to work for these people abeg DONT COMPLAIN. If you dont like the job just quit

Ricky_Ross:

Na today.
Come to think of it, is it by force to work for Chinese or Indian firms?
Just like police men that complain about their job everyday, am sure they know about the police job b4 they decided to take the job,
China and Indian companies are trash, only slow and lazy fools would work for a Chinese firm. If you finally make up your mind to work for these people abeg DONT COMPLAIN. If you dont like the job just quit

That was my initial view,but minimum working conditions and standards are put in place for a reason;bc d average employer will want to exploit his employee to whatever extent possible.Evn in China itself,d callousness of d Chinese employer is noted and frowned upon;d western world has cried out many times over safety,child workers and abuses rampant in many such chinese firms.D fact dat many Nigerians are willing to do anything& take whatever workplace abuse they come acrossjust to put food on d table shd not make us now condemn them;many know their rights but are handicapped because of real danger of sudden sack,inability to enforce labor laws,victimisation& evn arrest by d same law enforcement agents paid to protect them once they are bribed.
They are literarily in a 'no-win' situation when confronted wt d shocking reality of d nigerian situation,so pls when next u cast d blame,take a look at d environment round u & d sheer level of suffering some nigerians do pass thru

I'd like to support Ricky_Ross on this.
It's often said that "no one can take your self-esteem from you except with your permission.
By d law of supply and demands,anything over supplied will comand less value & must be cheap same goes for labour.
It's partly govt fault and largely individual decision.
As long as nigerians are ready to accept anything from the chinese and indians without raising eyebrows then nothing will change.
There are human right lawyers who can make life miserable for such employers but without people ready to fight it nothing will change.
Secondly, a large number of pple working for these people engage in all sorts of stealing.
For instance, I live in mile 12 where CCECC is constructing a road and on a daily basis, truck drivers sell diesel in 50ltr jerrycan everyday.
I am also an employer, some staff are notoriously dangerous! They can steal anything

Well, sad tales, but then, we have only heard one side of the story. Some of these workers, especially those from the North I am sorry to say, can be extremely lazy. I close my facility for Cmas and New Year holidays, ask them to resume on January 5th, and some of them straggle in on the 20th, 25th, etc. This happened several years in a row until I started a "no work, no pay" policy for absenteeism without valid reasons, and that is when they sat up.

Is it in the culture, the upbringing, the outlook? I cannot understand.