Blood-stained garments in Bangladesh
By Ramzy Baroud
As they spoke to a BBC correspondent in a an old, dirty room which they called home, a man sobbed. His face, wrinkled before its time, was a map of utter anguish.
"If she is dead," he said, "I just want to bury her with my own hands, so at least in my mind I know that I have finally found my daughter."
Then the despairing man succumbed to his tears. His daughter, Hamida had been working right alongside his other young daughter, who sat close to him as he spoke. The 12-year-old had miraculously escaped the collapse in the Rana Plaza building in
Dhaka on April 24 in which several garment factories were entombed.
Hundreds of dead bodies were retrieved, mostly women and young girls who made a living working under the harshest of conditions. Hundreds more were still trapped and presumed dead. Many of those who were freed had to sacrifice a limb as it was the only way to freedom. Yesterday, 14 days after the collapse, the death toll from Bangladesh’s worst-ever industrial accident reached 734 as 44 more bodies were pulled from the rubble, according to press reports citing official figures.
Over 3.5 million people work in the country's estimated 4,000 factories, generating about 80% of Bangladesh's total exports. Some estimates put the monthly salary of a garment worker in Bangladesh at $70 to $100. Others estimates were lower considering that the country's monthly minimum wage hovers above $38.
The pain of Bangladesh is a story dotted with tragedy, government corruption and unmitigated greed. It also ropes in many companies and garment distributors in Western countries, China, the Middle East and other places.
The West's hankering for cheap prices, untamable desire for "good deals" and lust after brand names is partly to blame for the crushed bones of cheap laborers like 13-year-old Hamida.
The collapse of the Rana Plaza building was not the first of such disasters and is unlikely to be last, especially since government action has been so lacking to say the least. As for most Western garment firms, they merely resort to public relations tactics to circumvent expensive safety responsibilities.
Abusive business owners often lock and bolt exit doors to ensure that workers don't dare venture outside. They build without permits and authorities turn a blind eye to their many illegal practices.
According to Human Rights Watch, the government has a workforce of 18 inspectors that are supposed to oversee and stop illegal practices in thousands of factories in the Shaka district which is the heart of the garment industry.
Workers' rights activists contend that officials are paid handsomely for their silence. HRW said "that factory owners - a powerful force in Bangladesh, with ties to government officials - are usually given advanced notice before an inspection," reported CBS News two days after the Rana complex tragedy.
Just five months ago, 112 workers died in a a fire in the Tazreen Fashions garment factory near Dhaka. Some workers jumped to their death from high windows to escape because the doors were bolted. The complicity of international companies was also found in the traces of the burnt building.
International Labor Rights Forum (ILRF), which advocates workers' rights, said in a press release on April 24 that "A Walmart-labeled product was found in Tazreen and now one of the factories in the Rana complex, Ether-Tex, had listed Walmart-Canada as a buyer on their website." Predictably, "Walmart has yet to contribute to the worker compensation fund for Tazreen victims."
But there is more that Walmart and others haven't done. It is yet to sign the Bangladesh Fire and Building Safety Agreement, which according to ILRF is a legally "binding agreement that has (only) been endorsed by two global brands, (and if implemented) would create rigorous inspections, transparency and oversight and ensure that workers and their organizations are an integral part of the solution."
To avoid the "hassle" of accountability, some companies decided to carry out their own inspections and of course made sure that international media know of their supposedly grand effort. The two companies that signed the agreement are a German retailer Tchibo and PVH Corp, which owns the brands Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger. But two more need to sign so that the agreement takes effect. Walmart and other large companies - Gap, H&M, JCP, Abercrombie and Kohl's - have yet to sign.
Considering Bangladeshi's dire need for foreign funds, expectations are low that the government will do much to right this ongoing injustice.
Attempts at unionizing garment factory workers have not been successful. A respected workers' rights activist Aminul Islam was reportedly harassed by the police, had his phone tapped and "domestic intelligence agents once abducted and beat him," reported the New York Times last September.
When he disappeared for few days starting last April there was a general understanding of who might have been the culprit until his body was discovered. He was tortured to death. His small office once stood amid towering buildings - some surely constructed without permit.
With his murder, Dhaka's workers have lost a great friend, an ally. Now they lost hundreds of their equally poor colleagues whose entire monthly salary is barely enough to purchase one Tommy Hilfiger t-shirt.
Ramzy Baroud (www.ramzybaroud.net) is an internationally-syndicated columnist and the editor of PalestineChronicle.com. His latest book is My Father was A Freedom Fighter: Gaza's Untold Story (Pluto Press).
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