“Waste management. Maldivian style.” is a blog posted on Island hopper’s diary and reads:

"...Came across this scene late afternoon yesterday. We waited around 8 minutes to get about 40 shots."

Among other things that are oddly enough in the Maldives there is a bizarre and back-breaking human act in practice in this modern times. Moving diggers. People moving and placing aluminium sheets by hand constantly to avoid crawler tracks of a running digger from damaging the road is dangerous, backbreaking hand labour that is dirty and bizarre. People's lives, even if they may be of the underclass or foreign, must not be put at high risk in the name of saving the road, which in itself is a lousy job. I have seen this myself but I believe there are no pictures in the public domain. Trust me, it is a terrible scene to watch.

Written or unwritten code, it is an unacceptable practice and a mockery to everyone and it must stop. The time to stop is now.

Population in the Maldives is a bit less than three hundred thousand; in addition to the local workforce, over sixty thousand expatriates fuel the economy. Half the expatriates fill underclass jobs while the remaining jobs are what the locals also envy. Are these skills we seek, or are these people willing to do jobs we no longer fancy? Could it be that the jobs in question are ones which we can no longer afford to do ourselves? Whatever our answers to these questions are, it must be recognized that expatriates too have to have rights in situations that they face; justice must be served with good ethics and integrity full stop 

May it be a local or a foreigner, honours must be given to those that choose to serve the nation in any capacity, right up to the top of the Civil Service. Doing REAL work and loosing apparently and becoming a subject for deportation in the case of foreigners, is a great loss to them. Shroud policing and inability coupled with vacuum or non-policy on expatriates is harsh; the only tool being ‘DEPOTATION’ of all involved in a case. Why should expatriates pay for the systems rudeness? Are these happenings perhaps a down payment phase, beating on the lifeguards trying to keep us from drowning? The issue lies at the doorstep of the government yet no one dares; until a politician is caught out in a high profile scandal, redemption appears impossible full stop

Besides provisioning sufficiently for the locals, a nation that chooses to relay on expatriates must confirm to good ethics and integrity for foreigners full stop

Fenfulhangi on his post ‘Lets talk about the guys that throw my rubbish away!!!’ portrays the prevailing underclass in the Maldives. Jaa’s recent post ‘Maldives: Hell for expatriate workers?’ reiterate and reconfirm the situation. In homes, removing waste and unwanted; taking care of the young and old; building, cleaning and maintaining; and chauffeurs. In tourism, technicians, boat crews, gardeners, labourers and porters. In business and the public sector, construction and building works, and cleaning.

Maldivians eschew these twenty thousand plus essential jobs because (a) one gets grossly abused by the very people they serve,  (b) what employers perceive to be a good pay are in fact pittance that Maldivians can't live with, and (c) Maldivians do not do jobs they don’t fancy.

Maldives has for sometime now, learnt of Bangladeshi workers' willingness to perform many of these underclass jobs for pittance whilst paying compulsory agent fees (local and foreign employment agency fees, and bribes involved in authorizing work-permits and related processes) measured in life saving and assets. What an opportunity for employers; who would be the constabulary?

Instead of setting frameworks/guidelines that are crucial for the country, the Maldives government itself engage in employing vulnerable Bangladeshi’s in public works such as road building, heavy vehicle operators and so on... and subject in excess of 10 work-hours-a-day, six-days-a-week, with basic meals and mass camp-type accommodation in intolerable temperatures of a tropical country for a monthly pay of $ 80.

What is less moralistic is using overseas workers in what are little better than conditions of slavery and not viewing it as slave labour but good economic sense; to have their earnings prowled and pummeled by street gangs and drug addicts; and the general publics’ xenophobia at this class. Is this a dark side to the use of workers in the Maldives; beating on the lifeguards trying to keep the country from drowning?

When the government in itself is misusing overseas workers, will it ever be able to lay rigorous employment regulations/policies for the country?

This does disgrace us.