Disabled citizen subjected to bullying, humiliation, and ill-treatment in the Rescue Government offices of “Hayyaat Tahrir al-Sham”
A disabled Syrian citizen was bullied, humiliated, and abused by staff of the Rescue Government of Hayyaat Tahrir al-Sham, where he was demanding compensation for his work with the service office in the light of the work injury he had that caused him to be disabled in a wheelchair, and according to information obtained by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights: “the man comes from Tal Hawash village in the western countryside of Hama, married, and has a family of 4 children, the oldest of whom is 11 years old and the youngest 4 years old.”
The man told his story to the “Syrian Observatory” saying: “Because of the area’s situation at the time; the regime allowed electricity to be fed to the villages surrounding its controlled areas, but the continuous shelling was causing permanent malfunctions and damage, and because of the need for electricity it had to be repaired despite the risks… I went to fix the electricity failures, and during the repair I gained good experience in it, and I looked for work in my field of expertise until I found a work within the services department in 2014, and my task was to fix power failures in many villages and towns in the northern and western countryside of Hama, and I was given a monthly salary of 49000 Syrian pounds.”
The man added in his testimony: “My suffering began in 2015 nearly 4 years ago, when I suffered paralyze in the limbs that put me in bed to this day, and when I was assigned the task of delivering electricity to al-Toba village in Jabal Shashabo at the western countryside of Hama, I went with several workers to the malfunction place and went up to the top of the tower trying to restore electricity to the village, and after a long effort for more than 2 hours of continuous work, I was able to fix it, and as soon as I finished; I started losing my balance and I couldn’t hold myself on the tower and I fell from the top, and I underwent a period of treatment without my health getting improved.” the source continued: “After the end of the treatment period my basic work stopped, and I was not able to do any other work due to paralysis, and my salary continued since 2015 until March 2016, approximately 6 months, and on this date I was informed that my salary is stopped, and I was forced to displace to Tal Hawash north of Syria, specifically to al-Majd camp, which is located in Atma camp community north of Idlib, because of regime’s operation against the area and the shelling, and I am now living in a small tent with my wife and children, in a very difficult humanitarian circumstances, from a shortage of food, medicine, and drinking water, until I was forced to send one of the children to work in a restaurant in Qah town for 10000 Syrian pounds.”
The source confirmed in his testimony to the “Syrian Observatory” that he tried to make an objection to the Rescue Government, saying: “I try to make an objection against the decision of suspending my salary, but no result, where I went to one of the offices of the Ministry of Services and I talked to them about what happened with me, and expressed my objection on suspending my salary, and they told me that “A new service body has been established and there is no longer a budget to cover the salaries of people who have been injured because of their work, and the way they treated me was so inappropriate; that one of the employees wanted to beat me.”