You're reading: Euro 2012 Construction Worker Blues

Money trail leads to black holes.

Construction workers are rushing to finish work near Kyiv’s Olympic Stadium, the gleaming modern centerpiece of Ukraine’s preparations for the Euro 2012 tournament and venue for the July 1 championship match.

But behind the impressive visage of the state-funded, $550 million stadium lies a tale of deaths, injuries and unpaid wages for laborers.

At least six people have been killed in stadium construction accidents since 2008, according to the Kyiv city prosecutor, while workers say the number of fatal victims is actually 10. But more common, workers say, is simply bad treatment of them.

When Vladimir Hurov heard about jobs to rebuild Olympic Stadium, he hopedthe work would help him support his retired parents back home in Zaporizhya Oblast.

“I thought nothing could go wrong with a job supervised by [Euro 2012 organizer] UEFA and the government,” said an angry Hurov. The laborer started work in February, but left in April after he and his team of 15 people were paid Hr 40,000 ($5,000) less than they were promised.

A Kyiv Post investigation revealed that hundreds of workers — out of at least 2,000 involved in the project — are demanding thousands of dollars in back wages. Besides the deaths, workers say many colleagues have been injured because safety rules were disregarded in the rush to finish construction.

Government officials say they know of no salary delays. They point to contractors and sub-contractors who, in turn, were either not available for comments or denied the allegations.

Anna Dobko, a spokeswoman for tournament organizer Union of European Football Associations in Ukraine, said UEFA is not responsible for working conditions at the construction site. In an interview with the Kyiv Post, Martin Kellen, UEFA’s chief operation officer said: “The important thing is that things are finished on time. We have no real view how things are actually done.”

The newspaper’s findings – from interviews with a dozen construction workers and trade union members – shed light on the way huge sums of government money spent on infrastructure projects have been appropriated by intermediaries without evidently reaching the people who do the work.

These laborers are often poor men from villages trapped in poverty and with no chance of employment back home. The total bill for government-funded infrastructure projects is around $10 billion, according to a report by Austria’s Erste Bank. Critics estimate that half of this amount has disappeared in kickbacks and other forms of corruption, allegations that authorities connected with the project deny.

Officials, including President Viktor Yanukovych, have trumpeted job creation as one of the advantages of hosting Euro 2012. The Olympic Stadium in Kyiv was one of scores of key infrastructure objects built or renovated for the tournament. The stadium is ready, but now there is a rush to finish the underground parking, stairs and other work around the stadium before the first game in Kyiv on June 11.

Hurov and his colleague Oleh, who refused to give his last name out of fear of losing his job, work in a group of 15 concrete layers. They say they were promised Hr 200 for every cubic meter of concrete they lay, but after a few weeks of work, the payments stopped. They say the company owes their group Hr 40,000.

The important thing is that things are finished on time. We have no real view how things are actually done.

– Anna Dobko, a spokeswoman for tournament organizer Union of European Football Associations in Ukraine

They say that they, like many other construction workers, were hired on the black market and did not have a contract with their employer. “The guy who hired us said he is with Tsentr Energobud construction company, but turned out to be a sub-, sub-contractor and just disappeared when we demanded money,” said 28-year-old Oleh from Odesa Oblast who is still working on the site. When the 15-man team realized it wouldn’t be paid, they all left, except for Oleh.

The director of Tsentr Energobud, Andriy Tkachenko, denies any involvement with the stadium at all. “We are a company based in Kharkiv, and though we have had projects in Kyiv before, we do not now,” Tkachenko said. He declined to say whether his company had ever hired people to work at the Olympic Stadium.

Three general contractors were appointed to rebuild the stadium – Kyiv-based construction company Kyivmiskbud, Dnipropetrovsk-based Master Profi and AK Engineering. These companies hired several sub-contractors who, in their turn, hired their sub-contractors.

“Usually these were small firms that have one employee – the director who just hired random guys on the black market,” said Vitaliy Makhinko, head of the construction workers’ trade union. Makhinko also said that he received complaints from workers who said they were employed illegally.

Oleksandr, a 45-year-old from Zaporizhya who has been working on the stadium since February, said he and his team have not received their wages for almost two months. “In April we were on strike for four days, demanding our salaries for February and March before the Easter holiday, because we needed money to go home for the holiday. They paid us for February only. Out of 22 people just me and another guy came back to work after the Easter holiday,” said Oleksandr, who also refused to give his last name for fear of being fired.

Like Hurov, Oleksandr did not sign any legal contract. “We were hired by the Svitlobud company on the black market. Their representative just made copies of our passports,” Oleksandr said.
According to business listings on the Internet, Svitlobud is a construction company registered in the village of Teplychne in Zaporizhya Oblast. The phone that the company provided was not valid when the Kyiv Post called, and the Ministry of Justice lists the firm as bankrupt as of September 2010.

We are paying the contractors on time and fully. If people are working there without a contract it means they work illegally and break the law. However, if they have these troubles [with salaries] – they should write me, even on Facebook, and we will try to figure it out.

– Deputy Prime Minister Borys Kolesnikov

The workers at the Olympic Stadium say they are paid Hr 150 for a day of work from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. Some kinds of work, like welding is paid better and most of these workers are full time legal employees of the construction companies. Some workers live in filthy army-style barracks around a half-hour walk from the stadium. The workers showed photographs of small rooms shared with 20 other people, along with rats and cockroaches. Other workers live in metal vans right on the construction site.

“Sometimes, when the boss says we have to finish something really fast, some of us stay for the night shift. Then you are paid Hr 150 more,” Oleh said.

Building Ukraine’s main national stadium is not only badly paid, but also can be deadly. According to the Kyiv city prosecutor, six people have died in accidents since construction began in 2008. “All of the people who died were legally employed,” said Myroslava Mushka, a spokeswoman for the prosecutor.

However, construction workers say officials do not count the people who were not legally employed and the real number is at least 10 fatal victims.
Oleh says the safety at the construction site is so loose that there are not even enough hard hats for everyone. “This morning I got to work a bit earlier and got myself one, but the chin strap was so loose there was no point in wearing it,” he said.

Trade union chief Makhinko said the picture in terms of safety and delayed salaries is similar – or even worse – at other Euro 2012 building sites. Ukraine has rushed to complete many other projects, including new airport terminals at Kyiv’s Boryspil airport.

Deputy Prime Minister Borys Kolesnikov, the government point man for Euro 2012 preparations, said he had not received a complaint from the construction workers about delays in salaries or safety issues.

“We are paying the contractors on time and fully. If people are working there without a contract it means they work illegally and break the law. However, if they have these troubles [with salaries] – they should write me, even on Facebook, and we will try to figure it out,” Kolesnikov told the Kyiv Post.

Hurov said workers are too afraid to speak up. “Many times I urged them to protest, to arrange a general strike, but they do not believe it would do any good. Most of these guys are from villages and are happy to be making any money at all. When they are cheated – they just pack and leave. On most construction sites it is the same or even worse,” he said.

Makhinko said the workers have a good reason to be scared. “At Olympic there was a case months ago when the workers started complaining about salary delays. The next day a group of men came to their dormitory and threatened them. So the men just packed and left with no money,” Makhinko said.

However, he is determined to try to organize workers. The union plans to rally outside the Kyiv city prosecutor’s office before the first Euro 2012 first game in Kyiv on June 11 and demand that the prosecutors react to their many complaints regarding salaries and employment.

That would be another poke in the eye for a government already struggling to rescue the tournament from PR disaster.

Kyiv Post staff writer Svitlana Tuchynska can be reached at [email protected]