SAVAR, Bangladesh // With deep cracks visible in the walls, police had ordered the building to be evacuated the day before its deadly collapse - but clothing factories flouted the order and told more than 2,000 people to go inside and keep working, officials said yesterday.
More than 200 people died when a huge section of the eight-storey Rana Plaza crumbled into a pile of concrete slabs on Wednesday.
The disaster, in the Dhaka suburb of Savar, came less than five months after a blaze at a clothing factory in Ashulia, another suburb, killed 112 people.
The tragedies have underscored the unsafe conditions faced by those who work in Bangladesh's garment industry making clothes for well-known brands worn around the world. Some of the companies in the building that collapsed said their customers included retail giants such as Wal-Mart.
Hundreds of rescuers, some crawling through the maze of rubble in search of survivors and corpses, worked through the night on Wednesday and into yesterday amid the cries of the trapped and the wails of relatives gathered outside the building, which housed several clothing factories and a handful of other companies.
Dozens of workers were found alive in the ruins yesterday, a rare success for rescuers who have pulled out 250 bodies.
An army spokesman initially announced that 40 survivors had been discovered together in a room, but the figure was revised to 24.
"The death toll is now 250," said Moshiuddowla Reza, a senior police officer from Dhaka district.
More bodies were being recovered and most of those who had died were women who worked in the clothing factories, he added.
After the cracks were reported on Tuesday, managers of a local bank that had an office in the building evacuated their workers.
But the garment factories ignored the instructions of the local industrial police and told their employees to go inside and keep working, said Mostafizur Rahman, a director of that paramilitary police force.
The Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association had also asked the factories to suspend production on Wednesday morning, just hours before the collapse.
"After we got the crack reports, we asked them to suspend work until further examination, but they did not pay heed," said Atiqul Islam, the group's president.
The garment manufacturers' group said the factories in the building employed 3,122 workers, but it was not clear how many had been in the building when it collapsed.
The junior minister for home affairs, Shamsul Haque, said that 2,000 people had been rescued by yesterday morning.
Dozens of bodies, their faces covered, were laid out beside a school for their families to identify them.
Thousands of relatives gathered outside the building, waiting for news, as thousands of workers from nearby clothing factories took to the streets across the industrial zone in protest.
Abdur Rahim, an employee who worked on the fifth floor, said a factory manager had given assurances that the cracks in the building were not a cause for concern, so employees went inside.
"After about an hour or so, the building collapsed suddenly," Mr Rahim said. The next thing he knew, he was waking up outside.
During a visit to the site, the home minister, Muhiuddin Khan Alamgir, said the building had violated construction codes and that "the culprits would be punished".
Abdul Halim, an official with the engineering department in Savar, said the owner was given permission for a five-storey building but had added three storeys illegally.
The local police chief, Mohammed Asaduzzaman, said police and the government's Capital Development Authority had filed separate cases of negligence against the building's owner.
Habibur Rahman, the police superintendent of Dhaka district, identified the owner of the building as Mohammed Sohel Rana, a local leader of the ruling Awami League party's youth front. Mr Rahman said police were also looking for the owners of the garment factories.
The collapse was even deadlier than the Tazreen factory fire in November that drew international attention to working conditions in Bangladesh's US$20 billion [Dh73.46bn] clothing industry.
That building had lacked emergency exits, and its owner said only three floors of the eight-storey building were built legally. Survivors said gates were locked and managers told them to go back to work after the fire alarm went off.
Bangladesh has about 4,000 garment factories and exports clothes to leading western retailers. The industry wields vast power in the South Asian nation.
* Associated Press, with additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
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Company name: Revibe
Started: 2022
Founders: Hamza Iraqui and Abdessamad Ben Zakour
Based: UAE
Industry: Refurbished electronics
Funds raised so far: $10m
Investors: Flat6Labs, Resonance and various others
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Tickets for the August 3 Fight Night, held in partnership with the Department of Culture and Tourism Abu Dhabi, went on sale earlier this month, through www.etihadarena.ae and www.ticketmaster.ae.
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Email sent to Uber team from chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi
From: Dara
To: Team@
Date: March 25, 2019 at 11:45pm PT
Subj: Accelerating in the Middle East
Five years ago, Uber launched in the Middle East. It was the start of an incredible journey, with millions of riders and drivers finding new ways to move and work in a dynamic region that’s become so important to Uber. Now Pakistan is one of our fastest-growing markets in the world, women are driving with Uber across Saudi Arabia, and we chose Cairo to launch our first Uber Bus product late last year.
Today we are taking the next step in this journey—well, it’s more like a leap, and a big one: in a few minutes, we’ll announce that we’ve agreed to acquire Careem. Importantly, we intend to operate Careem independently, under the leadership of co-founder and current CEO Mudassir Sheikha. I’ve gotten to know both co-founders, Mudassir and Magnus Olsson, and what they have built is truly extraordinary. They are first-class entrepreneurs who share our platform vision and, like us, have launched a wide range of products—from digital payments to food delivery—to serve consumers.
I expect many of you will ask how we arrived at this structure, meaning allowing Careem to maintain an independent brand and operate separately. After careful consideration, we decided that this framework has the advantage of letting us build new products and try new ideas across not one, but two, strong brands, with strong operators within each. Over time, by integrating parts of our networks, we can operate more efficiently, achieve even lower wait times, expand new products like high-capacity vehicles and payments, and quicken the already remarkable pace of innovation in the region.
This acquisition is subject to regulatory approval in various countries, which we don’t expect before Q1 2020. Until then, nothing changes. And since both companies will continue to largely operate separately after the acquisition, very little will change in either teams’ day-to-day operations post-close. Today’s news is a testament to the incredible business our team has worked so hard to build.
It’s a great day for the Middle East, for the region’s thriving tech sector, for Careem, and for Uber.
Uber on,
Dara
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Date started: March 2023
Founder: Jacqueline Perrottet
Based: Dubai
Number of staff: 10
Investment stage: Pre-seed
Investment required: $500,000
Company Profile
Name: HyveGeo
Started: 2023
Founders: Abdulaziz bin Redha, Dr Samsurin Welch, Eva Morales and Dr Harjit Singh
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Number of employees: 8
Industry: Sustainability & Environment
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Investors: Venture capital and government
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COMPANY PROFILE
Company name: Klipit
Started: 2022
Founders: Venkat Reddy, Mohammed Al Bulooki, Bilal Merchant, Asif Ahmed, Ovais Merchant
Based: Dubai, UAE
Industry: Digital receipts, finance, blockchain
Funding: $4 million
Investors: Privately/self-funded
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Qureos
Based: UAE
Launch year: 2021
Number of employees: 33
Sector: Software and technology
Funding: $3 million
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From Europe to the Middle East, economic success brings wealth - and lifestyle diseases
A rise in obesity figures and the need for more public spending is a familiar trend in the developing world as western lifestyles are adopted.
One in five deaths around the world is now caused by bad diet, with obesity the fastest growing global risk. A high body mass index is also the top cause of metabolic diseases relating to death and disability in Kuwait, Qatar and Oman – and second on the list in Bahrain.
In Britain, heart disease, lung cancer and Alzheimer’s remain among the leading causes of death, and people there are spending more time suffering from health problems.
The UK is expected to spend $421.4 billion on healthcare by 2040, up from $239.3 billion in 2014.
And development assistance for health is talking about the financial aid given to governments to support social, environmental development of developing countries.
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Defenders: Olaoluwa Aina, Abdullahi Shehu, Chidozie Awaziem, William Ekong, Leon Balogun, Kenneth Omeruo, Jamilu Collins, Semi Ajayi
Midfielders: John Obi Mikel, Wilfred Ndidi, Oghenekaro Etebo, John Ogu
Forwards: Ahmed Musa, Victor Osimhen, Moses Simon, Henry Onyekuru, Odion Ighalo, Alexander Iwobi, Samuel Kalu, Paul Onuachu, Kelechi Iheanacho, Samuel Chukwueze
On Standby: Theophilus Afelokhai, Bryan Idowu, Ikouwem Utin, Mikel Agu, Junior Ajayi, Valentine Ozornwafor
