Chinese Oilsands widow fights to keep insurance payout

howardx · 发表于 2008-6-17 07:53

http://www.canada.com/edmontonjo ... a-b1db-2d7dc5b9f933
Greed overtakes grief
Oilsands widow fights to keep insurance payout
Elise Stolte, with files from Jennifer Yang, The Edmonton Journal
Published: 7:10 am
EDMONTON - An unemployed Chinese woman whose husband was killed on an oilsands project last year is now fighting to hang on to $120,000 in life insurance and donations.

Ge Genbao, a temporary foreign worker, died when the great metal beams of a multi-storey tank collapsed north of Fort McMurray.

Ge's wife, 26-year-old Liu Ruijuan, lives with her father, mother and six-year-daughter in a one-bedroom brick house in a small village. They live off her father, a rural doctor who makes just $90 a month.

Liu Ruijuan and her six-year-old daughter Ge Ge, family of Ge Genbao, a welder killed in Fort McMurray last year.
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Font:****The region is one of the poorest in China and has frequent droughts. Liu's village, near the city of Zhengzhou, has fewer than 3,000 people, no bank and no secondary school. Houses have electricity but no running water. Anyone with money tends to head to the city.

Liu was kicked out of her mother-in-law's home a week after her husband's funeral.

When a Hong Kong lawyer showed up to confirm the widow's identity and lay the groundwork for the insurance payout, the village governor showed him to Liu's sister-in-law instead.

That woman showed up with Liu's mother-in-law to a meeting Wednesday in Zhengzhou. They signed for the cheques, took photos and did a phone interview with The Journal. Then, halfway through, the lawyer took back the cheques -- Liu had called the lawyer with only minutes to spare. She got her cheques Saturday.

Half the money will be held in trust for her daughter, Ge Ge. The lawyer was instructed to help her deposit the money in a bank before she returned home.

"My husband was the framework of our family. With his death, everything collapsed in the home," said Liu from Beijing, speaking through a translator.

Henan province, where Liu lives, is far from the controls of the central government, said Timothy Cheek, professor at the University of British Columbia's Institute of Asian Research.

There are few controls on local administrators, he said. "Just like here, if you win the lottery, shysters come after you. There will be plenty of that in China because the world that she lives in has far fewer rules."

"The thing that will most likely predict a happy outcome is the strength of her family network."

Liu's husband was a welder who learned his trade on a cousin's farm. He practised at home and then got a job with a local company. Two years in, without formal training, his boss picked him to be one of eight men heading to Canada to work as a scaffolder.

"I didn't want him to go," Liu said. But Ge said he could make $600 a month working in Canada, almost triple what he was making in China.

"He said he will only be away for one to two years. He said he would not go away again," Liu said. "And then we would build two small houses and do some business (out of one). This is what he promised to placate me."

Now, the widow says, his legacy will go to their daughter.

"The money I will use for my daughter's education and her wedding gift."

Ge left China on January 16, 2007. On April 24, Ge and Chinese electrical engineer Lui Hongliang died when the tank collapsed. Four other Chinese workers were injured.

howardx · 发表于 2008-6-17 07:54

The tank was part of the Canadian Natural Resources' $10.8-billion Horizon oilsands project, about 70 kilometres north of Fort McMurray. Alberta Workplace Health and Safety investigators finished their report last October but the file is still with Alberta Justice.

Health and Safety spokesman Barrie Harrison said Crown prosecutors must decide if any charges will be laid before they release the results.

Ge and Liu Hongliang were working for Sinopec, a Chinese company with 120 employees on site. Canadian Natural Resources cancelled its contract with Sinopec a couple months later, saying the company's work was not up to standard.

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Font:****Ge never signed for the life insurance. He's covered only because the ground rules negotiated between the union, the Christian Labour Association of Canada, and Canadian Natural Resources state that all tradesmen, union and non-union, must receive similar benefits. As a condition of working on site, Sinopec had to arrange for benefits and went through the union to get them.

The head of the union, Dick Heinen, doesn't know why Ge's signature doesn't appear. But Sun Life Insurance agreed to pay out anyway. In line with Chinese law, the money had to be split between Ge's parents, wife and child.

Ge's mother is still waiting for her cheques. She's legally entitled to them, but the union took them back when they discovered her daughter was pretending to be Ge's widow.

The engineer's family doesn't automatically get life insurance because, as a professional, he's not paid by the hour and is governed by a different set of rules. Negotiations to get more compensation for his family are ongoing.

After the worker's deaths, employees and contractors at the Horizon site raised a $114,000 benefit fund to be split between the two families, including the parents.

Engineer Liu's widow, 33-year-old Sun Shumei, met with a union representative in Jinan last Tuesday to receive the donations meant for her and her son. The $55,000 came with two boxes of sympathy cards.

Her husband left for Canada when his son was six months old. He came back to visit for Liu Baojun's first birthday and, as tradition dictates, he bought his son his first birthday cake. "He specially ordered it," Sun said through a translator.

Liu saw his son's first steps, then went back to Fort McMurray two days before the accident.

Baojun can now talk. "When he asks, 'Where's daddy?' I tell him he's working far away. Because he's still so young. I don't want to traumatize him."

Sun and Liu were married four years and lived in Jinan, a city of five million in Shandong province in northern China. He was learning English, and had recently become a member of the Communist Party.

While engineer Liu was in Fort McMurray, the couple kept in touch by MSN, an Internet-based instant-messaging service.

"I always reminded him to be careful and pay attention to his health," Sun said. "Every time he went someplace new, I worried about his safety."

The engineer was getting $8,800 for six months of work in Canada, about double what he would make in China.

Now, when her son gets old enough, Sun will look for a part-time job, she said.

She has a high school education.

"I want my husband to rest in peace," she said. "It doesn't matter how hard it is, I will try my best to raise my child properly and give him a proper education."

estolte@thejournal.canwest.com

Blindspot · 发表于 2008-6-17 10:02

烟雨江南 · 发表于 2008-6-17 14:34

pigyear · 发表于 2008-6-17 21:07

来自中国的外来劳工真够惨的。

howardx · 发表于 2008-6-17 21:13

一中国待业寡妇赢得12万保险和捐助官司.
一年前中国焊工GE GENBAO在FT MC 因油罐铁梁坍塌亡.其妻Liu Ruijuan and six-year-old daughter Ge Ge靠她年迈的乡下赤脚医生90$/月生活.其公公在儿子丧事完毕后一周将其儿媳KICK OUT .而香港律师寻找保险收益人时焊工之父竟将之SISTER取而代之其媳妇去与律师面谈(狸猫换太子)

老马 · 发表于 2008-6-17 21:30

为什么用 Greed 这个词？

howardx · 发表于 2008-6-18 11:17

So her sister-in-law greed(a selfish and excessive desire for more of something (as money) than is needed ) overtook the widow's grief.

没有青春的青春 · 发表于 2008-6-19 15:14

国内来的劳工真是受到严重剥削，但毕竟还是比国内赚得多

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[爱城新闻] Chinese Oilsands widow fights to keep insurance payout

Chinese Oilsands widow fights to keep insurance payout

大致意思:一中国待业寡妇赢得保险官司

Because her sister-in-law claimed insurance instead of widow