Enactment of labor law postponed further

JAKARTA (JP): The government has issued a regulation which further postpones the enactment of Law No. 25/1997 on Labor to allow more time for the House of Representatives to revise the controversial law.

The new regulation, No. 3/2000 was issued Sept. 25. It postpones the enactment of the 1997 law until Oct. 1, 2002.

Tianggur Sinaga, spokesman for the Manpower and Transmigration Ministry, said without the new government regulation, the law would have been in effect as of Oct. 1.

She said with the extension legislators now have more time to revise the controversial labor law.

"We were informed that the House's Commission on labor needs more time to revise the law," she said, citing that with the new regulation, the 1964 labor law remains in effect.

The 1997 labor law made notorious headlines when it was strongly criticized by labor activists. It was eventually passed under a cloud of suspicion after it was discovered that state- owned PT Jamsostek had forked out Rp 7.3 billion to finance deliberation of the bill.

However, the new legislature eventually canceled the law in October 1998. Since then the legislature has been debating revisions to the law which have yet to be completed.

Tianggur also said the government has submitted two bills on labor protection and development, and on the settlement of labor disputes to the House and both were being deliberated.

"The two bills that are much awaited by workers and hopefully can be ratified within the next three months," she said.

Wages

In a separate development, Tianggur also said that the ministry had raised the monthly minimum wage in West Java from Rp 286,000 to Rp 344,257, equal to the minimum wage in Jakarta.

"The decision was made in response to workers in Tangerang and Bekasi who have demanded an increase in the minimum wage in the province equal to that in Jakarta," she said.

Tianggur said the new wage level would take effect Nov. 1, two months ahead of the government's expected announcement of new minimum wage levels for the whole country.

Meanwhile, President Abdurrahman Wahid said in Ottawa, Canada, that the government would likely raise minimum wages by about 20 percent.

"The government will likely increase the minimum wages by 20 percent and not by 100 percent as demanded by labor activists," he said as quoted by Antara news agency.

The President was responding to Indonesian Prosperous Labor Union (SBSI) Chairman Muchtar Pakpahan who in Jakarta threatened to stage a national labor strike if demands to raise the minimum wage by 100 percent were not met.

"The increase (by 20 percent) is in line with the proposal of Minister (of Manpower and Transmigration) Al-Hilal Hamdi who briefed me before I left Indonesia," he said.

The President said he doubts whether Mochtar would be able to organize one million workers to stage a national strike.

"I ask Mochtar and Dita Indah Sari, chairperson of the National Labor Alliance, to realize that it is impossible to meet their demands because it would certainly affect Indonesia's trade overseas," he said. (rms)