Maputo — The governor of the central Mozambican province of Manica, Mauricio Vieira, has warned the Chinese company China Henan International Cooperation Group (CHICO) that it must respect Mozambican labour legislation.

Chico won the contract to build the new water supply system that will supply the provincial capital, Chimoio, and Manica and Gondola towns with water from the Chicamba dam. But although the project only began officially on 22 June, Mozambican workers are already complaining at the way CHICO treats them.

Among the complaints made to the governor, according to a report in the Maputo daily "Noticias", are lack of written work contracts, lack of overtime payments, lack of any fixed hours for the work, lack of protective equipment (gloves, face masks and hard hats), physical attacks upon workers, and insults. Extraordinarily, some of the badges worn by Mozambican workers bear the word "escravo" ("slave").

Reacting to these complaints, Vieira said the Chinese company must respect national labour legislation in its relations with its work force, and ordered an inquiry, headed by the Provincial Director of Labour, to assess the truth of the workers' claims.

"Workers must be respected and honoured, they should work with the necessary dignity and be treated as human beings", said the governor. He found reports of a lack of protective equipment particularly alarming.

"Something must be done to avoid the exposure of workers to danger", said Vieira. "They work with cement, iron, sand and are constantly subject to dust, and so they must be protected".

He warned that, if CHICO does not improve its labour relations, it will be liable to heavy fines. "Initially we shall use persuasion", said Vieira, "but if they continue to commit irregularities, we may resort to more severe ways of restoring legality".

Vieira condemned the use of the word "slave" on workers' name badges, and wanted to know the reason for the use of this derogatory term.

A representative of CHICO said it was just a mistranslation of the Chinese work or stone mason.