Saipan casino workers protest for payment as FBI cites illegal labour

Imperial Pacific International Holdings

14/04/2017 06:23

HONG KONG, April 14 (Reuters) - More than 50 construction 
workers hired for a casino resort on the Pacific island of 
Saipan staged a street protest on Friday demanding to be paid, 
after their employer was charged with illegally importing 
Chinese workers on tourist visas. 
    The Chinese workers, who entered Saipan on tourist visas and 
are not allowed to work, demanded that casino contractor MCC 
International Saipan, a unit of state-owned Metallurgical 
Corporation of China Ltd, pay them wages, said eye witnesses. 
    "MCC return my hard earned money," read a protest banner, 
according to a Facebook live update. The Facebook videos could 
not be verified independently by Reuters. 
    MCC did not respond to a request for comment. 
    "No passports. No work. No money," said local legislator Ed 
Propst, who observed the protests. 
    Hong Kong-listed Imperial Pacific  1076.HK  operates the 
Best Sunshine Live casino in Saipan. MCC is one of the 
contractors engaged to complete construction of the casino 
resort. 
    "Imperial Pacific International is strongly reiterating that 
it does not condone the hiring and or employment of individuals 
by illegal means," the company said in an email to Reuters. 
    "Imperial Pacific International is emphatic in its request 
to all of its contractors and subcontractors to follow all local 
and federal labor and immigration laws and regulations in the 
conduct of its business, including and in particular, the hiring 
of construction workers." 
    MCC, together with Beilida Overseas (CNMI) Ltd, were charged 
by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) on April 3 
with illegally importing and employing Chinese workers, 
including one who died in March, court documents showed. 
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N1HD106  
    Saipan is part of the Northern Mariana Islands and has been 
controlled by the United States since the end of World War Two. 
    Its cash-strapped government approved a casino in 2014, 
after which Chinese investment has skyrocketed and Chinese signs 
and business have mushroomed across the island. 
    Since Imperial Pacific opened a temporary casino on the 
island under two years ago, its revenues have wildly 
outperformed the top casinos in Macau in spite of China's battle 
to stop capital flight. 
    Scrutiny of the new Saipan casino project has intensified 
after the death of a construction worker in March and an FBI 
raid in April that found a list of more than 150 undocumented 
workers in a contractor's offices, as well as a safe containing 
several thousand dollars in U.S. currency, several hundred 
Chinese yuan and employee pay stubs. 
    Imperial told Reuters in April that it had paid construction 
contractors "requisite fees for processing needed applications 
for workers to work on the construction problems". 
    The company said it opened its new casino on March 31 but 
the attached resort remains unfinished with equipment strewn 
across the workplace. There has been a slew of more than 100 
work-site injuries from fractures to crushings in the past year, 
volunteers helping the injured told Reuters. 
 
 (Reporting by Farah Master, Additional reporting Shanghai 
newsroom; Editing by Michael Perry) 
 ((farah.master@thomsonreuters.com; +852 28431631 , +852 9631 
8262; Reuters Messaging: 
farah.master.thomsonreuters@thomsonreuters.net)) 
 
Keywords: SAIPAN CASINO/PROTESTS