Tearing Down a Sweatshop

When Peter Le agreed to travel to American Samoa to translate conversations between an American doctor and Vietnamese workers, he never imagined he'd wind up in the middle of a riot.

But that's exactly what happened to Le, an analysis programmer at Duke Medical Center, who was present when Vietnamese workers at a sweatshop in American Samoa protested their working conditions in November 2000.

Le was contacted through Sweatshop Watch, a coalition whose mission is to eliminate worker exploitation. The author of the e-mail, a doctor stationed on the Pacific island by the U.S. government, informed him that many workers had been abused and were attempting to take legal action. She said she needed assistance from Le, who is Vietnamese and who is listed on the Sweatshop Watch listserv, to translate and interpret court documents to the workers.

"She told me that she was trying to help and couldn't because she didn't speak Vietnamese," said Le. "The workers came to her when they were in trouble."

According to Le, during his second week in Samoa, workers at the Korean-owned Daewoosa clothing plant got into an argument with a site manager. When the manager ordered them to continue working, the workers tried to explain that necessary materials had not arrived. The manager complained to the owner, who ordered him to beat the workers, which touched off the riot, Le said. According to a U.S. Department of Labor investigation into the riot, one worker was beaten in the face with a pipe and had to be taken to the hospital to have her eye removed.

When the Samoan police arrived at the riot, according to Le, workers were running around the site frantic and confused. Because many of the workers could not understand English, they did not follow police orders. Le quickly stepped in.

"I got on the PA [public address system] and translated what the cops were saying. I told them to move to the corner and stay calm," said Le.

Next, Le contacted the local newspaper and a California-based Vietnamese radio station to let them know what was happening. The news stories that followed eventually led to arrests and the closure of the factory.

"I don't take any credit," Le said. "I am a man of faith. I am just an instrument. God put me in the right place at the right time. He used me to help those people."

In Vietnam, citizens are offered jobs in other countries through the Vietnamese government. According to a report by the anti-sweatshop activist group National Labor Committee for Human Rights (NLC), citizens paid to the Vietnamese government a $4,000-$8,000 fee as well as a tax on their incomes to be employed in America for three years.

"According to Asian Newsweek, Vietnam's goal is to export up to a million workers by 2010," Le said. "Right now, they export around 200,000, and the government generates almost 1 billion U.S. dollars. To Vietnam, that's a lot of money."

Once the workers sign up, recruiters place them in various sites. The workers exported to American Samoa, which is a U.S. territory, lived and worked at Daewoosa. The net pay usually averaged out to $1.17 per hour if they were paid at all, Le said. The workers who rioted told Le they had not been paid for three months.

"It's like, to get a job, you pay me money. Then, after that, you pay me 12 percent of what you make in income taxes. There's no such thing as free enterprise in Vietnam," said Le.

In addition to being underpaid, the workers were beaten for missing curfew and fed meals consisting of cabbage and rice soup, the NLC report said. They also had to pair up in 3-foot-wide beds, said Le, who was unaware of these conditions before he arrived.

"The first week I was there, I basically did research of what was going on. I tried to talk with workers, but I couldn't get into the compound," said Le.

Coincidentally, an Occupational Safety and Health Administration employee, a Samoan recruiting officer and Samoan congressman Eni F. H. Faleomavaega were on the Pacific island the day of the riot, said Le. Once OSHA caught wind of what was happening, they investigated the site. The U.S. Labor and Justice departments also did separate investigations, which led to fines and the recent arrest of the owner of Daewoosa, who was charged with involuntary servitude and forced labor.

"I told George Miller, who is the senior Democratic member of the House and a member of the Committee on Education and Workforce about it, and he wrote a letter to Elaine Chao, the Secretary of Labor," said Le. "Two days later, the FBI went to American Samoa and arrested the owner."

Soon after, according to Le, media in the United States began to run stories about the situation in Samoa, which led to criticism of free trade talks between Vietnam and the U.S. In response, Vietnam indicted the treasurer and director of the agency that recruited the workers, he said.

The sweatshop, which according to Department of Labor reports provided clothing for JC Penney, Target, Sears and other companies, has been closed. Most of the workers now reside in the United States as temporary citizens. Of the $700,000 in fines handed down by the U.S. government, Daewoosa has paid about $60,000, and some activists are looking at the retail companies to pay the remainder, Le said.

Le said many consumers buy products without knowing where they were made. "It's changed the way I buy clothes. Now, I only shop at Goodwill," he said.

Le hopes to continue his fight against sweatshops by making consumers aware of situations like the one in American Samoa, but acknowledges that it often is difficult to identify the factories where items are manufactured.

"I want to travel to high schools and tell kids about what goes on in sweatshops. Maybe it will change their minds when they are begging their parents for name brands," said Le.