Main source of labor violations

After years of maintaining my silence, I am once again compelled to speak out against the Department of Labor—or what I refer to as the Department of Favors—with respect to their continued shameful and embarrassing display of enforcement and policy procedures. For nearly 20 years since becoming part of the United States family, the federal government has provided millions of dollars to the CNMI Department of Favors for assistance purpose and further development of their organization. To date, what have they got to show in the way of positive developments relating to labor reforms?

It’s true that countless promulgated rules and regulations have been established and implemented throughout the years. And it’s just as true that former Labor director Dean Tenorio had also been involved in such pursuance and implementation, believing that such endeavors will improve the tarnished image of their organization. And since becoming the director of Labor, he had caused more problems, inflating Labor’s dilemmas rather than deflating them.

To prove this, one only needs to be aware that the Commonwealth continues to be overwhelmed by various complaints of unpaid wages, abandonment, confinement restrictions and, most predominant of all, serious cases of exploitations of minors and sex-trade activities. Oh yes, and when these despicable labor violations are committed, all investigations and blame tend to usually be focused primarily upon the employer alone, especially when illegal recruitment of minors are involved, instead of initiating an internal investigation to determine who or which authority had allowed such employment contracts to be approved and why a permit was issued, being that they—DOL and Immigration—are the approving authority for all employment contracts and permit issuance. And it does not require a rocket scientist to comprehend that Article 1, Section 4411, Paragraph (b) of existing statutes clearly states that it is the intent of the amendments to the act to provide stricter enforcement, control, and regulation of nonresident workers.

In addition, Section 8, Page-9 titled Criminal Penalties clearly and specifically states that: any employee of the Commonwealth government who knowingly or willfully issues or causes to be issued any official document which would facilitate either the entry of an alien into the Commonwealth or the employment of an alien in violation of the provisions of this Act or the provisions of any regulation promulgated there under is guilty of a felony, and shall be punished by imprisonment of not less than one year but not more than five years and by a fine of up to $10,000. A person convicted under this provision shall be terminated from his employment and shall not be re-employed by the Commonwealth government, in any capacity, for a period of five years after the date of conviction. The CNMI government ethics code also provides for other criminal penalties.

Previously, in the year 2000, the CNMI experienced the threat of a federal takeover. The CNMI lobbied tenaciously to block it and in fact succeeded through the efforts of a lobbyist that cost us millions of dollars. What started the CNMI on a collision course with Rep. George Miller and the federal government resulted from the sweatshop and exploitation issues and it escalated from there. On March 7, 2003; fuel was added to the fire when a notice was disseminated about officials from the Department of Labor and Immigration who were being investigated by the Office of the Public Auditor for alleged misconduct and possible abuse of power in the performance of their job in relation to the expedited processing of papers for Egyptians workers hired by a subcontractor during the initial construction phase of the new prison facility in Susupe. OPA, for whatever reason, refused to expose the outcome and/or findings of their investigation.

Now the CNMI is faced again with another shameful and embarrassing situation surrounding the illegal employment and arrest on April 11 of several persons for hiring minors in their nightclub and practicing illegal confinement restrictions. I wonder how Miller would react once again when he hears news of this shameful and embarrassing blunder surrounding the recruitment of minors for employment in the Commonwealth. Now let’s ask ourselves this question. Should an internal affairs investigation be conducted into this type of fiasco? Yes you guess it right; The Department of Favors and Immigration should be the primary focus for initially allowing the process, approval and issuance of permits to these minors in question, and that’s the bottom line, no matter how you slice the cake. Once identified, those responsible should be held accountable for such illegal acts in accordance with the law.

It would be interesting to know if the officials identified back then during the OPA investigation might once again have something to do with the approval and issuance surrounding the employment contract and permit of the minors in question.

What’s also interesting about the incident surrounding the minors is that Mr. Kenneth Miller, who now resides in Burma, has even wondered how this club and other similar clubs within the CNMI, could continue to operate with impunity over several years spanning back to 2003, especially with similar or identical labor and immigration violation cases occurring? Here again, attention must be directed to the organization entrusted to provide strict enforcement, control and regulation of existing labor statutes. But most important of all were his comment concerning being barred by club owners as a result of an actual employee from the either DPS or Immigration having to forewarn the club owners of Mr. Miller’s assistance to these club employees. Now this is a perfect example of corruption at its best which I have no doubt continues to permeate within an organization that is paid by taxpayers dollars and expected to provide stricter enforcement, control, and regulation, but even more importantly, to uphold existing labor statutes.

The Ben & Tim administration has vowed to initiate positive measures to rectify the tarnished image of our Labor and Immigration. What they should’ve considered during their transition audit of the Department of Labor and Immigration is that positive reform cannot be achieved effectively if the administration continues to maintain and appoint the very same officials who had been employed there for years and yet to date had done very little, if any, to prove that their contributions had in fact greatly reduced the ever alarming rate of local and federal labor complaints facing the Commonwealth. It should also be apparent to the Ben & Tim administration that after so many years, these officials have very little progress to show. All top-level officials that have had anything to do with decision-making authority within the organization should’ve either been replaced if they weren’t producing positive results as expected, or reassigned to a non-authoritative position.

Jack T. Quitugua
Garapan, Saipan