While I do not wish to create any conflict here or speak poorly about anyone, I must say that I have heard countless incidents where guest workers refused to train new, local or American citizen employees in a job.
Actually, shortly after I arrived on Saipan several years ago, I had the same experience. My guest worker counterpart who was training me would not speak in English but attempted to train me in his native language, despite the fact that he spoke English and I could not speak his native language. Nor would he answer most of my questions and just ignored me much of the time.
Additionally, since then, I have heard several other stories where guest workers refused to train a new local employee and would not answer their questions or help them to learn their new job. Perhaps they feared losing their own job, I don’t know.
But, Ms. Tantiado, I have to ask you, is this practicing a high standard of personal character and work performance? Is it fair to treat others in a way that you would not want to be treated yourself?
Again, I am not blaming anyone specifically, nor do I want to categorize an entire ethnic group by a few specific incidences. I feel that everyone should be treated fairly, regardless of their race, but I have heard far too many situations where U.S. citizens are being treated unfairly by their guest worker counterparts.
Because some guest workers are so fearful of losing their jobs, they discriminate against and will not properly train someone who is not a guest worker like themselves. I wonder why this is never reported?
I hope you can address this issue as it is of great concern to some people.
Maybe we really do need an EEOC representative here full time to ensure equal employment opportunities for everyone.
SUSAN MARCHITTI
Capital Hill, Saipan
