General Director of CCO in Chechnya dismissed for failure to pay wages

The leader of Chechnya dismissed Sultan Dudaev, the head of the Chechen Construction Office (CCO), from his position. The reason for dismissal of the top-ranking officer was in systematic failure to pay wages to workers of the organization. This was reported to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent by the Office of the Chechen leader and the Government of the republic.

"On February 27, at the government meeting, the leader of Chechnya has expressed his serious dissatisfaction with the fact that employees of some organizations and agencies receive no wages for a long time. Ramzan Kadyrov has ordered the government to immediately consider the issues related to those delays," said a staff member of the Office.

On February 24, the centre of Grozny hosted a mass protest action of former workers of Turkish construction companies "Penta" and "Bora Inshaat", who demanded to pay for many months of wage arrears and tried to get meet the Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov during his visit to the republic's main mosque "Heart of Chechnya". However, power agents dispersed the participants of the protest action and, according to the protestors, beat many of them, including women, with rubber truncheons. Police officials deny the fact of beating.

Ramzan Kadyrov himself, commenting on the situation, said that the rallies cannot solve the problem of getting wages and that the responsibility for that should be borne by general contractors and managers of organizations and companies.

Let us note that Sultan Dudaev, the dismissed head of the CCO, was appointed to the position in November 2010, after Ramzan Kadyrov had announced the transformation of the Republic's Ministry of Construction and Housing. In last May, after opening in Grozny of the largest North-Caucasian sports complex named after Akhmat Kadyrov, the Chechen leader awarded Sultan Dudaev with the highest award of the Republic the Order of Akhmat Kadyrov.

Meanwhile, workers of at least two organizations that were parts of the CCO the "Spetsstroi" and the "Chechengrazhdanstroi" repeatedly complained about the systematic delays of wages. Moreover, workers of the "Spetsstroi" told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that they still could not get their wages for May 2011, when their organization worked as a part of the CCO.

"The management promises to pay arrears in the nearest future, although everybody hardly believes in that, since we listened to such promises for many times. We are told that the CCO's management should have paid our wages, and they, in their turn, argued that they had paid all wages," said an employee of the organization "Spetsstroi", who preferred to remain anonymous.

Employees of the other organization, the "Chechengrazhdanstroi", which was also a part of the CCO, do not receive their wages for more than 2.5 years. Meanwhile, the organization's management argues that during that time all workers of the "Chechengrazhdanstroi" are on forced leave because of the absence of work. However, the very employees of the organization emphasize that all that time the special equipment of the "Chechengrazhdanstroi" was actively used in the construction of different facilities in Grozny and other places.

"The problem lies in the fact that construction companies use different gray schemes on payment of wages. Employees of organizations do not sign labour contracts; the companies are being formally announced as non-functioning and so on. And all that is being done to avoid paying taxes to the budget," commented on the issue an industry professional, who preferred to remain anonymous.

"Huge amounts are simply being embezzled by managers, who feel themselves absolutely inviolable, since they, in their turn, give bribes to top-ranking officials. And the problem cannot be solved by dismissal of certain officials, since it is a current system, which functions for years," tells the industry professional to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.