Laborers threaten to strike

JAKARTA (JP): Thousands of laborers staged a rally that stretched from the Ministry of Manpower and Transmigration to the Hotel Indonesia roundabout on Monday, demanding better wages and severance payments.

Grouped under the Indonesian Welfare Trade Unions and the All- Indonesian Labor Unions, the laborers threatened to go on a nationwide strike on June 11 this year if a 2001 ministerial decree on severance and service payments was not revoked.

The protesting workers said that the new decree did nothing for the welfare of laborers, unlike a former ministerial decree legalized in 2000.

Laborers said that the former decree had been beneficial for all manual workers in terms of service payments and severance pay, but was seen as non-profitable for businessmen, who had pushed for it to be reviewed. (ylt)