AROUND 120 foreign shipyard workers came close to staging an
illegal strike last month over unpaid wages. But they were talked
out of it by the Migrant Workers' Centre (MWC), a foreign workers
advocacy group backed by the labour movement.
The MWC kept this under wraps until the Ministry of Manpower
(MOM) confirmed the case with The Straits Times yesterday.
The workers - 100 from Bangladesh and 20 from India - were hired
by Akash Engineering and Technology, a sub-contractor for ship
building and repair.
Unhappy that their salaries for up to 31/2 months had not been
paid, some workers went to the MWC on Jan 15, saying that they
would not be turning up for work the next day unless they got their
money.
"They were very serious about it and had even returned their
safety gear to the company," MWC executive director Hans Goh
said.
He revealed that six MWC staff went to the workers' dormitory in
Lim Chu Kang that evening to talk them out of their plans. They
roped in an MOM director, who promised the workers that the
ministry would look into their salary disputes the next day.
"We told them, 'Once you break the law, that is it, we can't
help you any more'," said Mr Goh. "We also said that if their
employer fired them for refusing to work, they would lose
everything."
He would not be drawn into saying whether the MWC, which was set
up in 2009 by the National Trades Union Congress and the Singapore
National Employers' Federation, had averted an illegal strike,
preferring to call it an "industrial action" or "sit in", which is
the labour movement's parlance for protests by workers.
The Straits Times understands that a local shipyard that hired
the company as a sub-contractor paid the workers the salaries owed
the next day.
The workers declined to be interviewed because most of them are
still working for the company.
Contacted on the phone, the company's director, Mr Kakarlapudi
Venkata Madhava Varma, a permanent resident, said that the wage
dispute had been settled. "Only some payment was outstanding.
Everything has been sorted out, and I don't see any issue now."
He declined to reveal the amount of salary that was owed, saying
that the company was not in any financial trouble. Official company
records show that the company has a paid-up capital of
$850,000.
But it is not off the hook yet. "Investigations into Akash are
ongoing for possible offences under the Employment Act," the MOM
said, without elaborating.
While it is not illegal to strike in Singapore, there are
regulations to follow, including a registered trade union having to
get the majority of affected members to say "yes" by secret
ballot.
The last strike in Singapore was in November 2012, when 171 SMRT
bus drivers from China failed to show up for work to protest
against living conditions and being paid less than their Malaysian
colleagues. Five have since been convicted, and are serving jail
terms of between six and seven weeks for instigating the illegal
strike.
Member of Parliament Zainudin Nordin, who chairs the Government
Parliamentary Committee for Manpower, said that more could be done
to educate foreign workers about Singapore's laws and regulations.
"They have to have trust in our system and should not resort to
doing things that would break the law."
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Source: Straits Times © Singapore Press Holdings Ltd. Permission
required for reproduction.
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