The dangling body of the young Filipino -who we’ll be calling Jan – in the bathroom of a Dubai company, in the district of Muhaisnah which is inhabited by South Asian workers, ultimately adds up to many other corpses, getting mixed up in an indistinct decomposing meat pulp that leaves the world indifferent.
Slaves in the Gulf
The working conditions for the six million Pakistani, Indian, Bangladeshi, Egyptian and, Filipino workers who populate the country, are simply horrible. These men are practically reduced to slavery: abused and forced to work in risky conditions for salaries that sometimes do not even reach 100 euros a month – and some of them do not even see the shadow of a penny.
The situation is more or less the same in all the Gulf countries. Human rights organizations continue to tell us stories of confiscated passports leading to full control over these men: forced to work too many hours without respecting any safety regulations, forced to live in dilapidated homes, forced to suffer psychological, physical and sexual humiliation. Workplace deaths are simply normal and the same can be said for suicides(in 2022 in Qatar, national football teams from all over the world will play cheerfully in stadiums that so far have cost more than 1200 workers lives.
Pictures and blackmail
So why waste time with yet another Filipino suicide in Dubai, with a guy who decided to end his young life by wrapping a rope around his neck? His worthless body – a body reduced to a simple work tool in the United Arab Emirates – was found last year in July. Next to him a sheet of paper, a few handwritten words, an indictment against a 23 year old Pakistani boy, whom we’ll call Ansab. The latter was questioned and the police were able to reconstruct the whole story.
Jan was gay and arrived in Dubai fleeing poverty in the Philippines. He had a fling with a Pakistani colleague: they had sex and took some daring photos. In some shots Jan appeared naked, in others he was orally pleasuring his new friend. When the colleague returned to Pakistan – out of malice, recklessness, or whatever other reason – he sent the pornographic images to Ansab whom decided to take advantage of it. Ansab found Jan and threatened him: either he bought him an iPhone 5 or he would send the photos around with WhatsApp.
Without alternatives
We don’t know what went on in Jan’s mind, but what could he do? Perhaps he would have accepted the blackmail, but probably could not afford the cost of the smartphone. And who could he ask for help? Certainly not to the police, given that homosexual relations are severely punished in the United Arab Emirates. And where could he have escaped? In Dubai foreign workers must hand over passports to employers and have no freedom of movement. The only escape route was the bitter shape and taste of a noose.
Jan died, like thousands of other Asian workers in the Gulf countries. Strait by a rope, even more so by a system that protects no one, that protects even less those who are homosexual. Will the umpteenth useless death?
Pier Cesare Notaro
translation by Yuma
©2018 Il Grande Colibrì
photo: Il Grande Colibrì
its realy very hard sad story . I have remember one story. Wht evr i have heard from my best friend. An indian man(sayeed) who is working UAE he suddenly visit a gay site.where he got a beautiful face. Whose name was Rishi. Rishi was very simple gay loving man . But sayeed is totaly different . They was chating each other . They were in love. But sayeed tried to trap rishi. One day sayeed tried to black mail rishi. Rishi was afraid and beg my help . I have give some ph nos . He called them and he escaped . But till the date he never get such guts to complaint the police.