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@handtightenonly
Have you spent time in either, Ed?
Thought not.
It's true that migrant workers aren't treated brilliantly throughout the Middle East, but the organisation who are building the infrastructure for the World Cup notoriously treat their workers appallingly.
The office which I use most often is based in an area which sits in the centre of the labour camps here in Dubai. It's like a large town that operates and exists separate to the rest of the metropolis. I drive through this everyday and have interacted regularly with the guys who live there - so much so, I no longer pay "white tax" on anything I buy there.
I accept that the conditions aren't the best, but these chaps have a tremendous sense of survival and will do anything for you. The reason that their situations are different is because there has been so much negative press about the labour force being mistreated. Developers own vast swathes of low rise accommodation which provides them with (in some cases) better sanitary conditions than they were used to in their home countries. They send almost all of their money home to fund education, healthcare and whatever else is needed by their families in Nepal, India, Sri Lanka etc. In fact, the Pakistani's are very respected by the Emirati's because they take their religion significantly more seriously than the locals do...
The Qatari's are indeed a funny bunch: there's one family (the one in charge) that controls everything. One of the many issues that occurs throughout the Middle East is that when a company which is owned by anyone remotely connected to a ruling family fails, it's virtually impossible to recoup any outstanding funds - after all, how do you take a Sheikh to court?
Qatar keeps it's labour force in truly appalling conditions, paying them the lowest possible rates and generally treating them worse than cattle. A lot of the issues have arisen as a result of people being poorly educated - not just the workers, but the business owners too.
Besides, labour forces throughout the world are treated appallingly with increasing regularity. It's just that the Middle East is a popular "whipping boy" for the press in the UK.