The sweatshop condition at the Guangzhou factory where Ivanka Trump-branded shoes are manufactured was shared by abused employees of the plant. Associated Press reported physical and verbal abuses allegedly are taking place at the plant which is also in the center of a copyright lawsuit filed by a prestigious shoe brand.
Among the complaints of the factory workers, two of whom were ex-employees and one a current staff, is physical abuse. A manager, for instance, struck the head of a factory hand with the sharp-end of a high-heeled shoe that caused blood to drip from the employee’s head.
Other abuses
Beyond the physical harm made by abusive managers, work hours are too long beyond past midnight. The overtime aims to meet very high production quotas. Workers who make mistakes are verbally abused too, but physical abuses such as the high-heel incident, which occurred in 2016, were not rare events.
A current employee who saw the attack described the victim as having blood gushing out from the middle of the head. The injured staff sought treatment at the facility’s nurse station. The observed abuses must have been behind the mysterious disappearance of inspectors from China Labor Watch who were arrested by Chinese police for spying at the Huajian Group factory.
The three, however, were released on bail on Wednesday.
It was the last day of the 30-day maximum detention period limit for the labor inspectors.
Worst abuses in 20 years
The China Labor Watch listed several violations of China’s labor laws made by the Chinese government. Workers were allegedly paid one dollar an hour. Moreover, the workers are given only two days off in every month and forced to sign fake pay stubs with salaries higher than the actual amount paid the employees.
As expected, the Huajian Group denied all the workers’ complaints. The company insisted the accusations were not true, taken out of context, and exaggerated. It claims to follow the law and even accused the China Labor Watch of purchasing undercover work to negatively affect the employment of all employees of the Huajian Group.
According to Reuters, two of the labor inspectors worked secretly at Huajian’s shoe factory in Dongguan City, Guangdong Province. The third one also worked covertly at a plant in Guangzhou City, Jiangxi Province, that produced shoes with the Ivanka Trump fashion brand. Hua Haifeng and Li Zhao, who were deployed at the plant in Dongguan, were banned from crossing the Hong Kong border in April and May.
