Doha has made huge reforms, but gaps remain: Qatar human righs chief Maryam Al Attiyah

The head of the National Human Rights Committee (NHRC) in Qatar said Doha has made huge strides in legal reform but stressed that more could be done to improve laws on worker rights, freedom of expression and movement, and cybercrime.

Maryam bint Abdullah Al-Attiyah told Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, The New Arab's Arabic-language sister publication, that vague and overbroad language in several laws needed clarification to prevent a conflict with freedom of expression and movement.

But Al-Attiyah warned that despite widespread legislative reforms, systematic campaigns were in place to obstruct the World Cup and discredit Qatar, in reference to recent sustained criticism in Western media, but overall said she was confident that the tournament has been a success.

"The NHRC has made several recommendations to ensure [...]  laws be implemented to protect labour rights, and improve workers' ability to file complaints regarding delay of wages or grievances against employers," she said.

The NHRC has recommended that vague phrasing of some provisions in the penal code, which could be open to interpretation, be clarified particularly those with the potential to come into conflict with freedom of opinion and expression.

"Vague phrasing in several laws could lead to violations of freedom of expression and opinion," she explained.

She said specific phrases in the Cyber Crime Prevention Law could also pose a challenge to the exercise of these rights. 

Qatar is working to provide effective systems to implement legal protections, particularly as thousands of foreign workers entered Qatar to help with major projects during the build-up to the World Cup providing its own set of challenges. 

"The huge influx had presented the country with a major challenge around ensuring legal protection for the large number of expatriate workers," she said.

"Legislative changes were accelerated, and obligations put in place, for example, employers became obliged to provide transparent information on work being offered at every stage of the employment process."

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While restrictions on the freedom of foreign workers to leave Qatar have been, for the most part, lifted this does not apply to around 5 percent of the workforce, for reasons linked to the nature of their jobs. A committee has been established to look into these grievances, she said.

The Qatari human rights body has also recommended a broad range of other reforms including improving civil and political rights and the importance of looking at the provisions of Article 18 of the Terrorism Law.

Doha has made efforts in providing the highest levels of security and safety for citizens and residents, as seen in the 2020 Annual Global Crime Index Report where Qatar was ranked first out of 133 countries, but she acknowledged the law is also "overbroad" and should be reviewed. 

The NHRC has expanded its reach by increasing the number of languages and hotlines available to the population, developed its website, and opened an office at Hamad Airport in Doha where visitors to Qatar can access key guidance via information booklets. 

Meanwhile, the first Shura Council elections last year were also praised by Al-Attiyah as a huge leap forward in the country's path toward developing democratic processes and strengthening legal frameworks to allow legislative amendments to be passed.   

But she said that NHRC would like to see further legal reforms around labour to build on recent achievements such as the wage protection system, new legislation on changing employers, the minimum wage, and freedom of movement.

Developing mechanisms to allow Domestic Workers' Law provisions to be more easily enforced would be one way to achieve this, she added.

The NHRC has also encouraged the government to seriously consider signing the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights and to ratify the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women to help strengthen rights for women.

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The NHRC has also urged the government to incorporate provisions of the International Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities into Qatari law, bringing the country in line with international standards.

Its next endeavor will be to encourage legislative protections for elderly people which would entail reviewing local laws and amending them to reflect international agreements, according to Al-Attiyah

This is an edited and abridged translation from our Arabic edition.  To read the original article click here.

Translated by Rose Chacko