Friday, September 15, 2006

Camel jockey lawsuit...

...anyone else smell a rat?

Thanks to samuraisam for finding the lawsuit story. If you haven't read it, according to AFP, an American law firm has served legal papers on two of our most important people.

They are instituting a class action "for allegedly abducting thousands of young boys from South Asia and Africa and enslaving them to work as camel jockeys in races in the UAE."

The lawsuit was filed in Miami on behalf of the boys and their parents.

This is not a comment about the immorality of the child jockey saga. It's about the legal action.

Have I got this right? Impoverished, uneducated families from remote villages in South Asia and Africa have contacted a powerful firm of lawyers in South Carolina, instructing them to instigate a class action lawsuit in Florida.

Hmmmm...

Not usually a conspiracy theorist, I have to wonder what the agenda is here, and whose agenda it is.

Sheikh Mohammed's winning bids at the Kentucky horse sales are linked in, as is "They also own Dubai Ports World, whose involvement in port operations in Miami and elsewhere sparked Congressional concern, and the Dubai Holding Co. and its subsidiaries, which own hotels, apartment buildings and health care facilities."

7 comments:

Felicity Grace said...

Yes, I just saw the headline and came to your blog to see if you had a comment! Very strange. I thought the headline might have been referring to the domestic slavery that is still alive and well!

nzm said...

It was also announced this week that the bidding for the US ports sale by DP World will take place shortly.

My bet is that it's attached to the DP World ports' deal - if you sell us the ports cheaply, we'll make the lawsuit disappear.

Keef said...

Funny, I read all the local papers today and couldn't find any mention of a lawsuit.

Seabee said...

keefieboy, maybe they don't subscribe to AFP. I'm sure they'd print the story if they had the details.

nzm said...

The accused were seen hiding at the Jumeirah Beach Hotel today.

samuraisam said...

"I have to wonder what the agenda is here, and whose agenda it is."

I don't think that there is any agenda; I have an entire copy of the lawsuit, it's extremely detailed and seems very accurate. And it isn't all about the money.

I've been following the whole child slavery thing for a while; it definately happens. I suggest you read this mini-timeline I did regarding it.

Also, I link to a HBO documentary in that post; I highly suggest you watch it.

Seabee said...

Sam, yes of course it happened, I don't think anyone disputes that, it's been public knowledge for years. Even the repatriation of the jockeys got extensive coverage.

And of course the lawsuit is extremely detailed and accurate, it's prepared by a professional US law firm.

What I said was: "This is not a comment about the immorality of the child jockey saga. It's about the legal action"

My point is that there's no way in the world it was instigated by the plaintifs, who are the parents and the boys. They are impoverished, uneducated people living way out in rural South Asia/Africa.

They wouldn't know what a class action is, they couldn't organise one because they don't even know who the others are. They wouldn't know how to contact a US law firm to represent them. I could go on...

So if the plaintifs didn't instigate it, someone else did. And that's where an agenda comes in. Someone decided to instigate a lawsuit. It couldn't have been the plaintifs. So who was it and why did they do it?