Employers call on govt to review new labor law

Employers call on govt to review new labor law

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Employers Association (Apindo)
has urged the House of Representatives and the government to
review the controversial new labor law before its enforcement in
October.

Apindo Secretary-General Poerbadi Hardjoprajitno lashed out at
the new law yesterday, saying it was "too emotional" in its
threats of stiff sanctions against violating employers.

"The law presumes that the country's employers already have a
bad record and image and, therefore, threatens stiff sanctions
against them. But is that presumption really the case?"

Besides administrative sanctions, the law imposes between a
six month and a four year jail sentence, or a fine of between Rp
50 million and Rp 400 million on employers found guilty of
violations.

Poerbadi said such stiff sanctions would make small and
medium-scale enterprises reluctant to do business while foreign
investors would be deterred from investing in Indonesia.

"We regret that the government and the House did not
anticipate such negative impacts when making the law," he told
The Jakarta Post.

Employers violating a law must be punished, but the punishment
should be educative and workable, he said without elaborating.

The House, which declined to amend the law, has defended the
stiff sanctions as a means to press employers to respect worker
rights.

"Legal sanctions in the old law were too light, making many
employers prefer breaching the law rather than respecting worker
rights," Marzuki Achmad, chairman of House Commission V covering
labor issues, said in a hearing with Minister of Manpower Fahmi
Idris last week.

The current law, issued in 1969, threatens violators with a
maximum three-month jail sentence, or a fine of Rp 100,000.

So controversial is the new law that even labor unions and
non-governmental organizations have opposed it.

They argue that the new law is restrictive for workers and
hampers their ability to strike.

The new law was hurriedly deliberated by the government and
the House at the end of last year.

Despite being in recess, the House continued deliberations on
the law at several posh hotels in Jakarta.

It was later discovered that the deliberation was financed
using at least Rp 3.1 billion in funds from social security
company PT Jamsostek.

As the public outcry grew over the alleged misuse of funds,
then minister of manpower Abdul Latief claimed that he had
allocated the money under the instructions of then president
Soeharto.

Poerbadi, also president of Poerbadi & Associates legal
consultants, said Apindo was shocked at the speed in which the
House was able to deliberate the bill.

"The House commission processed the bill in only three months.
And its result is a controversial law," he said.

It was endorsed by the House in February, only a month before
Latief completed his term as minister of manpower.

Poerbadi called on both the House and the government to hear
the public outcry and postpone the law's enforcement.

"In this reform era, the government should make adjustments
and should not forcefully impose an unpopular law. It is not only
the government, but also employers, workers, labor unions and
NGOs who have an interest in the law," he said. (rms)