Controversy: Alibaba owner requires 12-hour workdays six days a week

The billionaire
Jack Ma is asking employees at China's largest e-commerce platform, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., to work 12 hours a day, six days a week, for a total of 72 hours a week.

The Chinese holding company that brings together Alibaba, Aliexpress and 15 other companies said at an internal meeting that the group did not need people who expect a typical office life of eight hours, according to a publication in the official report of Alibaba on the platform. Weibo, the social network

porcelain

longer range. He has thus supported the industry's work culture called "996", that is, from 9 am to 9 pm, six days a week.

The richest man in China has gone further. "Being able to work in 996 is a great pleasure," he said. "If you want to join Alibaba, you have to be ready to work 12 hours a day, otherwise, why do not you bother?"

According to the economic news agency
Bloomberg, his words are given in the context of an industrial sector that is full of stories of programmers and founders of new companies that die unexpectedly because of long hours of work and stress.

The repercussions

Ma's comments provoked an immediate reaction. "A lot of nonsense, not to mention if the company offers compensation for overtime," wrote a commentator in the publication Weibo. "I hope people will adhere to the law and not to their own reasoning," added the user.

"Bosses are doing '996' because they work for themselves and their wealth increases," reads another comment. Alibaba representatives have not responded to any of the different responses so far.

Ma's comments come amid a fierce debate. Chinese programmers have protested against their working conditions in a digital community called Ghithub, dedicated to programmers where programming codes are shared. They shared a message titled "996.ICU", referring to the working modality of creating new hours a day, six days a week. The message quickly circulated and became the most popular site, with more than 211,000 stars.

On this platform, the messages also multiplied following the virtual protest. "By following the work program of" 996 ", we will enter the UCI. [Unidad de Cuidados Intensivos]", according to an ironic description published on the project page" 996.ICU ".The user, whose identity is unknown, asked technology workers to give examples of companies that Abuse staff requesting overtime without pay The financial subsidiary Ant Financial has been appointed.