Disorders in developing countries’ legal and regulatory frameworks on protection of workers’ health and safety.

Abstract

Protecting workers from hazardous working conditions is a century old agenda. Of latest, the agenda has gained momentum because of an increase of workplace fatalities, injuries and diseases. Such an increase is global and the victims are none but the workers and their dependants. Laws and regulatory bodies are in place in many developing countries without so much help. The protection of Workers’ Health and Safety [(WHS) also Occupational Health and Safety (OHS)] in most of these countries is far from materialising. According to literature, the latter is significantly a result of serious disorders within legal and regulatory frameworks of these countries. The study identified wrong approaches to WHS protection; multiplicity of laws and regulatory bodies, scope and coverage of the working population; non-inclusion of critical workers’ rights; dominance of flexibility clauses and insufficient enforcement measures as amongst the critical disorders calling for urgent legal reform. The paper suggests ways forward in an attempt to seek reliefs to the toiling members of the working class.