ABU DHABI // The Ministry of Labour has referred 479 facilities and 528 workers for prosecution, for breaking national labour laws.
Maher Al Obed, assistant undersecretary for inspectional affairs, said there were more than 288,670 inspections last year within the private sector as part of the ministry’s commitment towards providing safer workplaces, meeting occupational health and safety standards, and ensuring housing for labourers was satisfactory, state news agency Wam reported.
“About 17,217 practices went against the law, according to last year’s reports, and the right legal procedures were undertaken against each violation,” said Mr Al Obed.
“Some of the measures taken against violating practices were just warnings, as the offence was not considered serious, such as misleading overtime calculations.”
Inspectors detected serious offences in 479 facilities, which were referred for public prosecution. Of these, 107 had not paid wages to their workers for more than two months, while 167 facilities had fake identities with no signed contracts with alleged employees.
Another 62 facilities allowed staff to work for other companies without permission, and 115 workplaces hired blacklisted labourers.
Eleven facilities provided incorrect documents to the ministry and 17 other workplaces were found to be operating as temporary employment agencies, flouting labour laws. Mr Al Obed said the ministry refused to service 2,050 facilities for repeated breaches of labour laws, and imposed fines on 142 other workplaces for breaking labour laws. But 2,280 facilities had resolved offences with the ministry during the past year.
“A total of 8,888 visits were carried out to labour camps to find out minor offences that did not amount to major risks towards the health and safety of workers, yet the ministry filed warnings to fix such irregularities,” said Mr Al Obed.
newsdesk@thenational.ae
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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