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Photo of Chinese worker in unfinished barracks, from Pacific Daily News, Guam 2009
May 31, 2009
Guam barracks 2009, photo by Pacific Daily News
And here is what the Chinese workers had to say:
Guam living quarters 2009, photo by the Pacific Daily News
Saipan living quarters 1998, photo by W. L. Doromal ©1998
One would have hoped that Guam had learned a lesson from its neighbors to the north. Apparently not. What are some of the problems with the local CNMI labor system, and perhaps with Guam's?
In the 1990's I met with and interviewed hundreds of foreign contract workers who were illegally recruited to Saipan and found themselves without jobs, places to live and food. Others who actually had employers lived in squalid conditions in rundown barracks and were routinely cheated of their wages. You can read about their conditions in this 1998 report.
Who could have imagined that similar labor abuses would be repeated in Guam 11 years later? I could have. Why? Because any guest worker program that imports foreign labor and fails to offer a pathway to citizenship, promotes the notion that the foreign workers are replaceable commodities. In such programs they are typically not treated with the same respect and dignity afforded to "local citizen" workers. You can see that in the tomato fields in Florida, in the meat packing houses in Arkansas, in construction sites on Guam, and in clubs and other job sites in the CNMI.
To clarify, when I speak of a pathway to citizenship, I mean a pathway to U.S. citizenship (and all the rights that accompany such status) for long-term foreign workers hired through guest worker programs on U.S. soil. I am not referring to some concocted local permanent status plan to be thrown as a bone to the foreign workers to convince the federal government not to replace their local program and not to grant U.S. citizenship to long-term foreign workers. Such a plan, probably not even legal under U.S. law, only would serve to continue to keep the foreign workers indentured by imprisoning them in a confined locality, restricting their movement, and controlling their freedom and rights. It is rumored that such a plan is being discussed in Saipan right now.
Why should we not be surprised that this happened on Guam? Because any guest worker program that suppresses a free labor market encourages the exploitation of the foreign contract workers.
Recently, a hideous case of labor abuse was brought to light in Guam. About 40 men contracted from China were discovered to be living in unsafe barracks and they are owed wages going back as far as two years.
From the Pacific Daily News:
A local contractor that allegedly didn't pay its immigrant workers, kept them in the country longer than allowed, and faked documents and plane tickets to cover it up can no longer operate on Guam. The board suspended the license of Hua Sheng International Group Corp. and Responsible Management Employee Steven Wang yesterday, according to a press release from the Guam Contractors Licensing Board.
Wang and his company acted unethically by submitting fabricated documents that suggested a group of Chinese workers had left the island when they really stayed, the release said. Moreover, the company has not paid $63,000 in civil penalties it owes to the Department of Labor, the release stated.
"Not one single payment has been made to the Department of Labor addressing this civil penalty," the release said.
On April 7, more than 20 disgruntled Hua Sheng H-2 workers marched from their barracks in Yigo to the Guam Department of Labor office in Hagåtña to file a complaint saying they weren't being paid.
About two weeks later, the Department of Labor wrote a letter to the company that said the agency believed the back wages were owed to the workers.
The letter also said the workers must go back to China, since a petition to extend their H-2 status was denied by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service.
The cheated workers "must go back to China" where they will let everyone know what a hell-hole the United States was for them, how the U.S. has weak enforcement of laws, and how, as foreign contract workers, they were treated very poorly. Two years and no one knew they were being cheated? Shame on Guam and shame on the U.S. for allowing such systems to exist.
Here is a description of their barracks :
Saipan barracks 1998, photo by W. L. Doromal ©1998
Buildings are made of plywood, tin and concrete blocks. No doors separate the inside from the outside. Extension cords run through weeds from another building to provide electricity.
At night, the man sleeps under a mosquito net because his window has no screen. He showers in cold water that comes from a bare spout emerging from the wall. He has worn the same clothes for three days because he has to wash clothes by hand.
Life was difficult back home in China, but he and the 40 other workers living in the compound said they didn't expect that their search for better-paying jobs on Guam would put them in these kinds of conditions.
The more than 40 men have lived in the makeshift worker barracks for about six months. They said they refuse to leave Guam until they receive what they said are unpaid wages totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Saipan barracks 1998, photo by W. L. Doromal ©1998
Guam barracks 2009, photo by Pacific Daily News
And here is what the Chinese workers had to say:
The workers asked not to be identified because they feared retaliation against themselves and their families in China. Maneuvering around buckets placed on the floor to catch rain that leaked through the roof, they gathered recently in a room of the compound to talk about their conditions.
"We never thought it would be like this," one worker said through a translator. "The U.S. is a free country -- they have rights here."
The man said he was brought from Nantong, on the banks of China's Yangtze River, a year-and-a-half ago to work for local construction company Hua Sheng International Corp. Now, he just wants to be paid and go home...
..."We came here legally," one worker said. "Why should we go back as criminals?"
"Everybody here is waiting to get paid," a worker said, gesturing around the group of men. He said their families -- all said they have wives and children in China -- are waiting for the money.
Going back empty-handed would be shameful, he said.
Indeed, why should they return to China in shame? They feared retaliation? I must have heard that statement over 100 times. "The U.S. is a free country --they have rights here," one worker said. Why do our U.S. guest worker programs allow for the rights of foreign workers to be trampled? How many foreign workers have returned to their homelands shamed, disillusioned, and with less money then what they had before they paid recruitment fees?
Did these forty men get their money? From the PDN:
On April 7, dozens of the workers marched 12 miles -- from their barracks off Wusstig Road to the Guam Department of Labor's offices in Hagåtña -- to complain. Authorities have ordered the company to pay, but the workers said they are still waiting for the money.
One of the workers said when he and his co-workers were at the Labor Department recently, Wang waited by the department's door and gave them checks -- checks that bounced when they tried to cash them.
The worker said he was still waiting for more than $14,000 for more than two years of work for Hua Sheng.
Both the federal and local Labor authorities, as well as other agencies, continue to work on the case, agency representatives said recently.
Hua Sheng has no valid permits for worker dormitories, said Tom Nadeau, environmental health administrator for the Department of Public Health and Social Services.
Greg Massey, administrator for Guam Labor's Alien Labor Processing and Certification Division, said he couldn't comment on his open investigation into this case, but he said he hasn't seen a situation as bad as this in more than 10 years.
Guam living quarters 2009, photo by the Pacific Daily News
Saipan living quarters 1998, photo by W. L. Doromal ©1998
One would have hoped that Guam had learned a lesson from its neighbors to the north. Apparently not. What are some of the problems with the local CNMI labor system, and perhaps with Guam's?
- Too little oversight and coordination between the local and federal agencies tasked with enforcing regulations.
- Not enough staff to conduct routine scheduled and unscheduled inspections of workplaces and barracks.
- Fear of retaliation for speaking out.
- Lack of translators in local offices.
- Lack of coordination between home and host countries in setting standardized regulations for recruitment and recruitment fees.
- Local administration of labor programs in places where nepotism and strong family ties interfere with enforcement and regulations. Corruption.
- Lack of consistent application of regulations and policies, which results in denial of due process for abused foreign contract workers.
- No jail time or real consequences for the worst labor abusers (except perhaps in cases of human trafficking). Lack of teeth in local laws.
- Refusal of local system and government to adequately assist victims and cheated workers in getting unpaid judgments and justice from abusive employers.
- Shift of responsibility and blame from agency to agency and department to department.
- Deportation of foreign contract workers before they receive their pay or unpaid judgments.
- No required exit surveys of all foreign nationals to determine if they are owed any back wages or were otherwise cheated on U.S. soil.
- Lack of adequate local and federal funds.
- Local system's denial of abuses and problems; presenting the local program to the federal government as being something it is not.
- No pathway to U.S. citizenship for long-term foreign contract workers.
The PDN quoted Mary Bauer from the Southern Law Poverty Center who noted that the system is what promotes abuses:
Cases of abuse happen across the country, said Mary Bauer, director of the Immigrant Justice Project at the Southern Poverty Law Center, based in Montgomery, Ala. The civil rights organization currently represents stateside temporary foreign workers in eight class-action lawsuits.
Bauer testified to Congress last month that major changes to the federal program for temporary foreign workers are needed.
"Guest workers are systematically exploited because the very structure of the program places them at the mercy of a single employer," she said. "It provides no realistic means for workers to exercise the few rights they have."
Will Guam be able to handle 15,000 or more H-2 workers expected to enter the island to work on the military build-up? It's doubtful. Not unless they take immediate steps to identify flaws within the program, hire and train adequate staff, and work with the federal government (and even advocates) to make a plan to ensure that foreign contract workers who are invited to Guam to work will be respected and protected. Should Guam, the CNMI, or any other U.S. territory or state have local control over federal H-2 workers? I say no. There should be one consistent regulatory policy for the mainland and all territories. Every U.S. guest worker program should reflect just and democratic principles. The time for comprehensive immigration reform is long overdue.
Guam barracks 2009, photo by Pacific Daily News
Saipan Barracks 1998, photo by W. L. Doromal ©1998
