By Staff Writer
Zamel Azarbaijan, a worker who died of self-immolation as he was protesting in front of Abadan’s municipality building, died Sunday, May 26, 2018 at the hospital.
His son-in-law says: he was under pressure from all sides; he had not been paid for five months and he was rarely coming home ….
Zamel Azarbaijan was a serviceman at the district three of the Southwestern city of Abadan’s region municipalities, who had not been paid for at least five months; on Monday, May 20. He burned himself at work. One of his colleagues who tried to save him also got 35% burns and hospitalized.
According to one of his colleagues, after this painful incident, the employer paid all the demanded wages of the workers of Abadan municipality at once. Although all claims are paid simultaneously, but Zamel died in the hospital after several days; his deferred pays are worthless now; “Zamel Azerbaijan” will no longer return.
After all, this immediate “payment” raises this question in mind that if the employer had the “ability” to pay, why did not pay before coming to last straw for the workers and before Zamel reaches the point that sets himself on fire.
The story that his son-in-law recounts is the answer to many questions:
“Honestly, he was under pressure from all sides; he was lagging behind on the bank installments on one side; on the other hand, he had not received his wages for five months; He always said he had reached to the bottom; He was taking different directions to come home; He was saying: He did not want to be in sight with the shopkeepers; I owed to all the shops from the butchers to the bakers and the supermarkets; The fact of the matter is that my father-in-law was under pressure from all sides; I’m going to ask mercy for him where he is now; he was not seen by his lenders for six months; I am telling them; He could not bear it anymore; He is gone now … “
Zamel’s son-in-law says: “If I were him, I would have done something alike; the problems were not one or two, they were too many; I did not even know about many of his problems; this man who was already a grandfather and had worked all his life did not even have a hut of his own. Ten days ago his landlord asked for the rent, threatening: “If you do not pay your rent, I will return and place your belongings on the curb.”
He did have a young unemployed son at home as well, which is not a small chastisement. Life was very difficult for him, he was barely seen at home; he would come home four in the morning to sleep until eleven in the morning; then, he would be gone; he said that I could not get home until I get my “salary”.
Zamel has three children; two girls and one son; three grandchildren; his son has high school diploma; done his military services, but is also unemployed; he has not been able to find work. On the day of the incident, Zamel has called his wife asking “heat up the food that I eat and go to work. His wife had told him, there is no money at home to get a gas bottle; we do not have gas; perhaps this was the last dialogue of this man with his wife and children….
Why workers are in such a situation; this is a question that has long been unanswered; municipal service workers are hard workers, which requires heavy labor. The work is not easy. With all these hardships, there are fewer days that man would not see a report in the media about delay of several months in wages of these workers.
Hossein Habibi (secretary of the coordinating council of the Islamic Labor Councils of the country) says that the middle-aged worker in Abadan, who hasn’t been paid for five months, burns himself is not something strange and abnormal, because he believes that the individual has descended to a place that will become desperate. When your tolerance boundaries reject and leave no room for you, suicide is not strange.
He says: five months of no wage, makes one ashamed within the family and community; when one has not been paid for five months, the landlord will not let you have accommodation; you will be indebted to all relatives and acquaintances, which means getting to the bottom. All this is the result of not respecting the “labor rights” which, with great regret, should be said that this non-compliance has become a common practice these days.
In his opinion, the incident could be an alarm: I hope this self-immolation will be considered a serious alarm.
