Dubai, July 24: The United Arab Emirates government will control and monitor all private sector wage payments from September to protect workers’ rights, a government aide said Thursday. The move comes as some crisis-hit firms delay salaries.
The payments system will give the Labor Ministry access to information on all salary and wage payments in the private sector, the ministry said.
Ahmad Saif Belhasa, consultant to the ministry and chairman of the UAE Contractors Association, said: “When workers don’t receive their wages for three to four months this creates a problem, especially in the current economic conditions.”
The UAE has faced criticism from human rights groups who allege it turns a blind eye to cases of nonpayment of wages, lack of medical care and substandard workers’ housing.
The majority of the country’s 4.5 million population are foreigners, many of them Asian construction workers hired to build the UAE’s modern cities. In recent years workers have gone on strike over late payment of wages.
The government said in a statement it aims to increase “transparency and stability in the labor market” with the new system.
The Labor Ministry had previously implemented a similar scheme with companies in the construction sector, demanding that they provide details of salary payments, said Belhasa. “Now, the ministry decided to implement this on a wider scale by ensuring companies send wages to the assigned bank,” he said.
—-Agencies