By David Thurber/AP
A first group of 16 Vietnamese workers, mistreated at a garment factory in American Samoa, returned home on Feb. 18 while over 200 others remained behind, waiting for plane tickets from their state-owned recruitment company.
The workers said they received no wages from their Korean employer, Daewoosa, for eight months, were refused medical attention, and received only meager meals of fried potatoes, onions, cabbage, and an occasional serving of meat.
“I’m glad to have left that miserable life,” said Nguyen Thi Hong, 22, tears in her eyes. “I was very scared. I’ll never work overseas again.”
The plant, which made clothes for J.C. Penney Co. and other retailers, has been the subject of numerous investigations and was closed down in January.
J.C. Penney stopped selling the factory’s clothes when it learned of the abuses in December.
Fifteen members of Vu Ngoc Anh’s family traveled 95 miles to meet her at Hanoi’s airport with bouquets of flowers.
“It’s a very sad experience for her, so we brought many people to welcome her,” said Anh’s sister, Nguyen Thinh Lam. “We want to give her some spiritual support.”
Each of the workers paid about $5,000 to one of two Vietnamese government-owned recruitment agencies, in hopes of improving their families’ financial status by working in Samoa. They said they now have no money and no way to repay the recruitment fee, most of which was borrowed at high interest rates.
“Most of us are farmers, so it’s a lot of money for us. We used our house as collateral, so I’m afraid we’ll have to move out because we have no money to pay it back,” said Nguyen Thi Dao, a relative of another worker.
The incident highlights the potential pitfalls in sending workers overseas, an effort Vietnam has undertaken to ease unemployment in a labor force swelling by 1 million people every year.
Last year Vietnam sent nearly 32,000 workers overseas, generating $1.25 billion in revenue. Labor was one of the country’s major export earners. An official of one of the recruitment agencies earlier said they had learned from the workers’ plight.
“Regrettably, this happened. This is a good lesson for us, for our future labor export contracts,” said Le Trung Nghia, director of the International Manpower Supply recruitment company. |
