I'd also like to bring awareness to the experiences of my friend Jahangir Munir, a Pakistani man who had emigrated and worked in the U.A.E. legally for two decades only to be wrongfully jailed, abused and deported without reason in the past few months. As we speak he's fighting to put his life back together in the unstable environment of his homeland.
The Pan-Arabic colours in the United Arab Emirates flag are meant to represent unity throughout the Middle East. And yet one of the Crown Royalty of the UAE, Sheikh Issa bin Zayed Al Nayhan, brother to Khalifa, Emir of the Throne and one of the richest men in the world, can be seen on video (Youtube even) torturing Afghan business partner Mohammed Shah Poor for over 45 minutes for his involvement in a grain deal gone bad in 2005. Among the methods used by Issa with help from local police flunkies included shoving sand into the victim's mouth, a rectally inserted cattle prod and the Prince's SUV running over Poor for good measure. An additional 25 separate charges of torture have since come up in the past year against Sheihk Issa in the mainstream media on both sides of the Atlantic. Tapes became available via former business partners with copies from Prince Issa's private collection where he would watch his own handiwork at home.
The tourism board of the UAE would like to draw you into the rich luxury of the Middle East as a safe democratic nation with its expressive ads of white sands and clear waters. Yet this experience has come from slave-labour conditions inflicted on the workers brought in from the 3rd world-Bangladeshians, Indians, Sri Lankans, Filipinos and now quite fashionable around town, Nepalese workers. Wages are withheld, false 'visa fees' are enforced, contracts are broken and when you arrive in the UAE, the construction company or maid service who you signed up with confiscates your passport. If you're in construction you'll be shipped to a work camp in the desert and add to the statistics of work-related deaths (and suicides) on-site (168 on record in Abu Dhabi for the year 2004) in the half-completed skyscrapers. Those skyscrapers are designed by some of the top architecture firms in the world who will look the other way on work conditions once they've cashed their cheque. Should you attempt a wildcat strike or form a construction union to fight against the injustice of your situation you can look forward to assault at the hands of the 'Teharyat' (Secret Police) and pick between the jail cell shared with the odd political prisoner or a return to the work site. If you happen to be a maid you're at risk from abuse of any nature behind closed doors or have it openly flaunted in public by your superiors.
Perhaps you rise above the construction rabble and find a job as a private driver or work the limo circuit. You can break the law and drive as fast as your employer insists you go, but there's a catch: If your wealthy boss racks up enough driving fines he'll offer to put you in jail in substitution, and give the courts a payoff of $20,000 AED ($5000 USD) to cover your time behind bars. On the other hand as I was told in interviews with those who've spent time in the infamous Al Wathba jail in the desert south of Abu Dhabi, should you crash your employers car and be unfortunate enough to be neither Emirati nor connected you can look forward to being jailed without formal charges. One of my contacts is the aforementioned Jahangir Munir, and this was his experience 5 years ago. A limo driver for private hire, Munir hit a tree while driving the car of his employer. Once illegally jailed without being told of the charges he was subjected to sleep deprivation, beatings, and in his last holding cell, overcrowding with over 60 other prisoners This doesn't match the public face Abu Dhabi presents to the crowds for Formula 1 and football matches in the press-clippings from the heavily-censored local newspapers .
Mr. Munir had been freed from the Al Wathba jail late last year and after a period of struggle found new work as a driver. Once his work visa was up with his previous employer Munir renewed with a German rental company to continue his driving career in the U.A.E. and with those funds support his son's education back in Pakistan. Unfortunately Munir's arrival at the Abu Dhabi immigration courts to pay his visa fee came with a shock: he was jailed for 25 days in a squalid cell at the Al Taweela detention center, the last stop before being booted out the door and back to Pakistan. This happened with Munir being denied his rightful belongings and pay due to a clerical error that the courts refused to acknowledge despite proof of their incompetence. Based upon interviews with other contacts and Mr. Munir's own countrymen's shared expierences within the detention center, this treatment happens all too often. Munir described the conditions at Al Taweela as the worst period of his life with sick men packed together like pigs in humid pens. Now Jahangir and his son must start anew, hopefully in a Western nation with a clearer understanding of human rights. Munir's life in his troubled homeland of Pakistan is one which he doesn't want his bright son to lead with its rising crime rate and politcal instability.
As Munir was expelled from the Emirates the gaudy Burj Khalifa was opened in Dubai to international fanfare. This is the same Burj Khalifa where over 60 Indian workers had died on site in private findings by Indian worker's studies. The opening of the soon-to-be surpassed World's Largest Tower closely coincided with Dubai defaulting on a $59 billion dollar debt to investors including Barclays Bank, RBS and HSBC. Abu Dhabi, the richest of the Emirates, now owns its wayward brother Dubai and will carry on the tradition of attracting foreign investors, western vacationers and third-world builders to hold the whole structure together.
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