China killings reveal plight of migrant workers
2005-09-15

Category Migrant Workers Homicide Nations China States Ningxia Gansu

BEIJING - A Chinese labourer who was insulted when he tried to claim unpaid wages ran amok and killed four people, triggering anguish across the country about the plight of millions of abused migrant workers.

Wang Binyu, from the undeveloped western province of Gansu, went on the rampage after he was mistreated "like a dog" by managers while trying to get his back pay, the Beijing Youth Daily said on Thursday.

His employers in the neighbouring region of Ningxia owed him 5,000 yuan ($620) and offered him just 50.

Wang had previously turned to the local labour department and the courts for help to get his money, but all in vain.

He killed the four and stabbed and injured a fifth person then promptly handed himself over to police, the newspaper said. The victims included managers and family members.

The killings took place in May, and he was sentenced to death in June, but the case has only just made the national press.

Now it has stirred debate across China where 120 million migrant workers labour in the construction and manufacturing sectors, away from their villages and families and open to abuse.

"I couldn't stand it any longer," Xinhua news agency quoted Wang as saying from his cell. "I had had enough, so I grabbed the knife and stabbed the five people.

"For me, prison is a better place than the construction site. Do you know how many migrant workers die while constructing those high buildings? I just wish people did not look down on migrant workers. Society should be more concerned."

Desperate unpaid migrants have committed suicide in recent years, in some cases throwing themselves from buildings they were helping to construct in order to draw attention to their plight.

Some 930 million of China's 1.3 billion people live in the countryside, and guesses of the number of surplus rural workers range up to 200 million.

Last year, Xinhua reported that 20 billion yuan ($2.47 billion) owed to migrant workers went unpaid.

"It is the bosses and managers and the legal people who abuse migrant workers and ignore their rights who should be punished," the Youth Daily quoted one person saying on a Web page. Reuters