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DOHA, Qatar (AP) — A top Qatari official involved in organizing the country’s World Cup estimated for the first time the number of deaths at the tournament at “between 400 and 500,” significantly higher than any previous proposal through Doha.
The comment by Hassan al-Thawadi, secretary-general of Qatar’s Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy, gave the impression of coming off the headlines in an interview with British journalist Piers Morgan.
He also threatened to reignite complaints from human rights teams over the record of the first World Cup in the Middle East for migrant labor, which has built stadiums, subway lines and the new infrastructure needed for the tournament worth more than $200 billion.
In the interview, excerpts of which Morgan posted online, the British journalist asked al-Thawadi: “What is how fair and realistic in general do you think of the migrant who died, because of the paintings they do for the World Cup in its entirety?”
“The estimate is about 400, between 400 and 500,” al-Thawadi replies. I have the exact number. This is all that has been discussed. “
But this figure has been publicly discussed through Qatari officials before. The Supreme Committee’s reports from 2014 to the end of 2021 include only the number of deaths of the personnel involved in the structure and renovation of the stadiums that now host the World Cup.
These published figures put the total number of deaths at 40. They come with 37 of what Qataris describe as non-work incidents, such as attacks on the center and 3 incidents in the office. A report also lists the death of an employee from the coronavirus amid the pandemic.
Al-Thawadi highlighted those figures on the discussion of the stadium paintings in the interview, just before proposing the death toll “between 400 and 500” for the entire tournament infrastructure.
In a subsequent statement, the Supreme Committee said al-Thawadi referred to “national statistics covering the 2014-2020 era for all (414) domestic work-related deaths in Qatar, covering all sectors and nationalities. “
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Since FIFA awarded the tournament to Qatar in 2010, the country has taken steps to review the country’s labor practices. This includes getting rid of their so-called kafala employment system, which linked staff with their employers, who had the right to decide whether they could do so. He has just left his jobs or even the country.
Qatar has also followed a monthly minimum wage of 1,000 Qatari riyals ($275) for staff and mandatory food and housing allowances for staff who do not get those benefits directly from their employers. It has also updated its employee protection rules to save it. Deaths
“One dead user is too many. It’s transparent and simple,” al-Thawadi added in the interview.
Activists have called on Doha to do more, especially when it comes to making sure staff get their pay on time and from abusive employers.
Al-Thawadi’s observation also renews doubts about the veracity of personal government and corporate reports on staff injuries and deaths in the Arabian Gulf states, whose skyscrapers were built by personnel from South Asian countries such as India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
“This is just the latest example of Qatar’s unforgivable lack of transparency about employee death issues,” said Nicholas McGeehan of Fairsquare, a London-based organization that advocates for migrant staff in the Middle East. “We want knowledge and thorough investigations, not indistinct figures announced through media interviews.
“FIFA and Qatar still have many questions to answer, where, when and how those men and their families died got compensation. “
Mustafa Qadri, executive director of Equidem Research, a hard-working consultancy that has published reports on the structure of migrant workers’ history, also said he was surprised by al-Thawadi’s comment.
“That now he comes and says there are hundreds, it’s shocking,” he told The Associated Press. “They have no idea what’s going on. “
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