By Hajaratu Kalokoh
The Chinese-run Bintumani Hotel is under the spotlight for alleged violation of Sierra Leone’s labour laws by subjecting its local staff to maltreatment.
The management of the Five Star hotel which is located in Aberdeen is accused of operating a racist policy that has left its Sierra Leonean employees overworked with incommensurable pay.
The aggrieved staffers, some of whom spoke to Politico on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal from the management, said not only are they underpaid, but that they are also denied benefits that go with employment, like medical allowances, which their Chinese counter-parts enjoy. They are also unhappy that the management employs a policy of engaging local workers on temporally contract basis, rather than permanent employment, even when they will have spent many years with the company.
“We are treated badly by the Chinese, with no better salary, no health facility for workers. We are paid Le21, 000 per day. Whenever we approached Labour [Ministry] they will tell us that work is very difficult to secure,” one of the aggrieved staffers lamented.
The sources told Politico that they had engaged local authorities and other relevant government institutions about their plight. They said whenever they complained to these authorities, some of their colleagues ended up losing their jobs, leaving them suspicious that government officials disclosed their identities to the hotel management, instead of seeking to address their concerns.
Bintumani Hotel is managed by the Beijing Urban Construction Group (BUCG), under an agreement with the Sierra Leone government which used to own the hotel that went out of business in the late 90s.
The hotel, initially constructed in the 1980s, derived its name from one of the tallest mountains in West Africa, Mount Bintumani in the northern Sierra Leonean district of Koinadugu.
The hotel was very popular among tourists prior to the 1991- 2002 civil war which, in addition to mismanagement, contributed to its collapse.
Under an agreement between the Chinese government and the Koroma-Administration, the hotel was revived by BUCG which said it spent US$5million into refurbishing it and making it one of the top notch hotels currently in the country.
Today Bintumani is home to one of the most sought after recreational and business gathering facilities, including a conference center of international standard, besides the services it provides for foreign visitors and holiday makers.
But, apparently, the people who make the experiences of these guests enjoyable hardly have anything good to show for their efforts.
Babayor Kamara worked as a swimming pool attendant for three years, until he was allegedly sacked unceremoniously last March for requesting for a salary that is not commensurate with his service.
“I was overworked; our initial arrangement was working for eight hours. We were three, but the HR [Human Resource Manager] sacked one of our colleagues, so we started working from 8 hours to 12 hours (a day),” Kamara explained.
He said he asked the HR office to consider either replacing the sacked employee to lessen the work load on them or increase their salary to take care of the overtime work they did.
But instead of getting a favourable response, Kamara was sacked for questioning the management, he said.
“Staff at Bintumani are really maltreated. The worst of it is that the Deputy Manager, who is black, is the most corrupt; she is not seeking the welfare of black employees,” he added.
The hotel management is also accused of lying about the composition of its foreign staff. The local staff say they get paid far less than their Chinese counterparts for the same job they do.
“The last time we had a delegation from the Parliamentary Oversight Committee [on employment] they (Bintumani administration) said they had five Chinese employees, but we have more than 17 Chinese. The GM [General Manager] is very racist; we work very hard with meager salary and they pay the Chinese employees US$3, 000 or US$5, 000 for the same job we do,” the anonymous staffer said.
The Deputy General Manager is Dunstana Thompson, a Sierra Leonean. The aggrieved staffers say she has been used by the Chinese to execute their unfriendly labour policies against them.
Kamara recalled days when a senior official would summon the local staff in a particular department to a meeting only to summarily sack them for “no justifiable cause”. He said the official would ask the workers to choose someone among them who should be sacked.
Ms Thompson declined to comment on any of the allegations against her or the management, noting that they had no problem with any worker.
“We do not have any problem or issue at present as we are complying with Labour laws in the country,” she said in a snappy telephone conversation with this reporter.
Cliff Chong, the Human Resource Manager of the hotel, also declined to comment or respond in detail to the allegations, noting that he’d just taken over the job and had no idea of what happed prior to his assuming office.
Chong however referred us to the hotel’s lawyer, whose identity or contact details he refused to provide.
“I am new here as I was employed in December (2019). But we are trying to operate under the law. (If workers have) complaints, there are so many channels, like the Ministry of Labour, or an association they could report to. It is better for you to communicate with our lawyers on these allegations,” Chong, a Chinese national, said in a brief exchange in his office.
Sierra Leone’s minimum wage has increased from Le 500, 000 to Le 600, 000 as per government’s announcement.
Employee salaries in Sierra Leone are subjected to statutory deductions of 5% as contributions to the National Social Security and Insurance Trust (NASSIT), whiles employers are required to contribute 10% to the scheme, bringing it to a total of 15%.
Because none of the local workers at Bintumani Hotel, according to the accounts of the aggrieved staffers, are given permanent contracts, the hotel doesn’t pay them minimum wage, nor does it pay for them NASSIT contributions.
Observers say keeping staff on temporal basis and daily wages could be a clever way to circumvent labour laws.
These revelations by the staff of Bintumani shine a light on a very dark side of the hospitality industry of Sierra Leone. However, it is hardly an isolated case.
Reports of maltreatment of workers is generally a commonplace in the country. Most employers have taken advantage of the country’s weak Labour laws and the desperation of the people in a country with one of the highest unemployment rates to violate workers’ rights.
The apparent inefficiency of relevant government institutions and authorities tasked with checking these labour related issues have particularly given employers a field day.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Labour and Social Security admitted to this.
Lansana Baryoh-Sesay, Information Officer at the Ministry, said they had no knowledge of what was going on at Bintumani Hotel.
“This is news to me. But this will also give me the task to report this matter to the Commissioner of Labour,” Mr Baryoh-Sesay said when contacted by Politico for comment.
“I will take it to the higher authority so that we can set a team to visit Bintumani Hotel to know whether they are complying with Labour laws,” he added on the phone.
The Labour ministry spokesman said because of limited funding, the Ministry hadn’t been able to fully monitor employment agencies to ensure they operate within the country’s labour laws.
“We are challenged to go out to ensure compliance of the Labour laws; we do not have the capacity to start with. The size of the workforce in this ministry is small. Our budget allocation is a big challenge for us to implement and ensure compliance of the labour laws in the country, but yet even with those challenges we have been doing our best to put the situation under control,” said Baryoh-Sesay.
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