Managers at a home improvement firm in Southern China have been jailed for cruel and unusual punishment of workers in which staff were flogged and forced to drink urine and eat cockroaches for missing sales targets.
The appalling events, which took place in Zunyi, Guizhou province, were captured on video and widely distributed on the Chinese social media platform Weibo this week. Footage titled ‘Employees who failed to meet their goals forced to drink urine’ has already been viewed over half a million times.
Video of the alleged beatings shows a topless man being whipped in front of his colleagues with a belt while other clips show workers drinking conspicuous yellow liquid.
Screen grabs of alleged internal company communications make for harrowing reading.
“If the sales goal has not been met by the end of this month, the team leader will have to eat three cockroaches for each failed sale,” one text message read.
