It was because of a link with Xianqi, a village in China that has since been subsumed into Fuzhou International Airport, that Jinxiu Zheng ended up working in the Rose Palace Chinese restaurant and takeaway in Portlaoise, Co Laois.
His experience with the Chinese owners of the business has resulted in him being categorised officially as a trafficked person and awarded more than €28,000 after he took a case to the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC).
However Jinxiu has not yet managed to secure payment of the award, which was made in January, and it is for this reason that he agreed to be interviewed.
“I would like to get paid the award because, after all this struggle, if the fine is not paid, it would be an encouragement for other exploitative employers,” he says.
The Migrant Rights Centre in Ireland (MRCI) is helping try to secure payment of the award, and the Sheriff’s Office has been engaged. Jinxiu believes many people like him here under the work permit scheme are trapped in a situation where if they complain about their employers, they will be sacked and lose their right to live here.
“I think a lot of people [in that position] just swallow it up and keep working, for five or six years, to get out of their situation. Like a slave.”
Jinxiu lived in the village of Xianqi, where his parents grew watermelons, peanuts, and radishes, until he was in his mid-teens, at which time his family moved to Xianning, a city more than 900km away.
Mei Feng Zheng (no relation), a director, along with her husband Yu Ming Zheng, of Ming Feng Ltd, the company behind the Rose Garden restaurant, also came from Xianqi, and she and Jinxiu were in a WeChat group comprising mostly of people from there.
“It was about buying things from overseas and having them sent to you in China,” says Jinxiu, speaking through an interpreter. “She also got to chat about life in Ireland, the education system, the social welfare system, and the income standard.”
In his late 40s and married with two adult children, he says it was during the Covid-19 pandemic that communication over WeChat resulted in the suggestion that he come to Ireland to work in the Rose Garden.
“I wanted to improve the living standard of my family, and possibly bring my children [to Ireland] for education,” he says.
He believed that if he came to Ireland, worked, and paid tax, he would eventually be able to bring his family over to join him.
In the WRC, he claimed that Yu Ming Zheng sought substantial payment in return for giving him the job, including money he was told would be given to the Revenue. Yu Ming Zheng, he says, “said that only when I pay this tax would I be able to bring my family here”.
The restaurant owner did not give evidence to the WRC but disputed this claim in a submission. The WRC did not rule on the issue, saying it was outside its jurisdiction. It found that Jinxiu was never registered for tax by Ming Feng Ltd.
Jinxiu travelled to Ireland in July 2022, where he lived for free with his employers over the restaurant. According to his evidence to the WRC, he was promised €15.78 an hour for a 39-hour working week but instead got €300 in cash for working up to 60 hours a week.
By September 2022, he says, he realised that something was amiss. “I kept mentioning the money for the tax, are you paying the tax yet, and [Yu Ming Zheng] kept making excuses, and that’s when I decided that something is wrong, and that I started to look for help.”
He says that during this time when he was complaining, he was told that if he was dismissed, he would lose the right to live and work in Ireland.
Eventually, with the help of the MRCI, and represented by Arthur Cox solicitors, he brought a case and secured an award at the WRC against Ming Feng Ltd.
As a recognised victim of human trafficking, he has a right to remain in Ireland, and work, for the time being. “When I was in Portlaoise I was scared, and depressed, all the time. Now I am working in another restaurant, and being given accommodation, so I am better,” he says.
A request to Yu Ming Zheng for an interview or comment met with no response.
The WRC website shows that in 2016 Ming Feng Ltd, trading as the Rose Palace, was prosecuted under the Employment Permits Act, which governs the employment of people without proper documentation.
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