THE Hong Kong manufacturer of the world's best selling toys - Mighty Morphin Power Rangers - is being investigated for alleged human rights violations at its factories in Thailand.
Bandai HK, the Hong Kong subsidiary of a Japanese toy conglomerate, was using agents to recruit up to half the 3,000 workers at its Power Rangers production plants on the outskirts of Bangkok - a policy deemed illegal in Thailand since it allowed companies to avoid providing staff with even basic welfare.
These workers were also forced to hand over as much as 15 per cent of their monthly pay in 'commission' to the agents to secure monotonous production line jobs in factories operating 24 hours a day to get the toys to Europe and the United States in time for Christmas.
Thongbai Thongpao, an adviser to the Thai parliament committee on justice and human rights who is also Thailand's leading human rights lawyer, said: 'If Bandai are doing this then it's illegal. It's a way of exploiting labour.
'They just say they're not employing the women, the agents are.' His probe into the factory follows inquiries by the Sunday Morning Post into conditions at the factories in the Bangkok suburb of Samut Prakarn. He has called for reports on labour conditions at the factory, where workers in an all-female labour force are paid less than $1,200 a month. Bandai HK declined to comment on the case.
During a visit to the factory earlier this month, the Sunday Morning Post was told almost half the workers were recruited by the agents - shady characters known as Kamnans - who scour villages in the impoverished northeastern region of Thailand and truck them down to Bangkok.
In return for finding the women jobs, the Kamnans demand 20 baht (about $5) out of their 135 baht daily salary.