Latief fights to improve workers' welfare

By Ridwan M. Sijabat

JAKARTA (JP): Is it possible for a businessman here to make a decision that benefits workers? Braveheart businessman and minister Abdul Latief has.

During the last three years of his tenure in office, Latief, in his capacity as minister of manpower, has issued dozens of decrees to improve labor conditions. It is Latief who annually issues decrees on increases in monthly minimum wages. He has phased out the ambiguous "daily status" often given to low- ranking workers and made annual Idul Fitri allowances compulsory for all companies.

The last hike raised minimum wages 10.7 percent and is set to take effect April 1.

His controversial rulings, to which fellow businesspeople have often objected, have led to his increasing popularity among workers as well as the domestic and foreign press.

"I have taken these steps not to seek popularity or get Soeharto's attention but to improve our criticized labor record," he said on board his airplane flying from Jakarta to East Java, where he was going on an industrial tour.

He said labor conditions would continue to improve, regardless of foreign and local criticism.

"We must concede that our labor record in the past was not as good as it is now. But much progress has been made," he said, adding it could not be done in a day.

Latief is the founder and president of ALatieF Corporation, which operates in retail, hotel, handicraft and shrimp pond businesses. He expressed his one-time obsession to raise current monthly minimum wage levels to 125 percent of the minimum basic living needs of a single person by the end of the Sixth Five-Year Development Plan.

"By 1998, minimum wage levels should reach 125 percent of the minimum basic living needs because the current wage levels meet nearly 107 percent of basic needs," he said.

He warned, however, that minimum wages were only given for workers who were employed for less than one year. He said workers who have been employed more than a year should be paid in accordance to the remuneration system regulated in the collective labor agreement between a company's management and workers. The agreement is supposed to be reviewed every two years.

"Almost all of the 40,000 mid-scale and big companies in Indonesia pay their workers wages that are far higher than those set by minimum wage regulations," he said.

Violations

"However, many companies have violated minimum wage regulations or have requested to be exempted from the regulations because they are mismanaged. No companies have gone bankrupt for paying their workers in accordance to regulations."

Last year, Latief was threatened by lawsuits from textile and garment companies for his controversial rulings enforcing managements to pay their workers for 30 days, instead of 25 days, a month and phasing out the unclear status of daily workers.

"I have never been scared in the face of such lawsuits, protests, or objections because I follow a true path. I have been pawning my life for the sake of workers."

He said local and foreign investors should be proud of Indonesia's workers, who still accept low pay in an otherwise booming economy.

Many companies, especially labor-intensive ones, have complained that the increasing invisible costs and levies they have to pay to government offices and agencies and security authorities have forced them to reduce their labor costs to the minimum.

Last year, Latief invited several other ministers and executives from the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KADIN) to slash the legal and illegal levies imposed on companies.

As a result, several government ministries, including the Ministry of Manpower, and provincial administrations slashed the number of legal levies and imposed stiffer penalties on officials found guilty of demanding illegal payments from companies.

Latief, who was once dubbed Mr. UMR (for upah minimum regional, or regional minimum wage), expressed his satisfaction with the government's and the managements' goodwill and efforts to cut down on the invisible costs that hinder companies from paying their workers according to government regulations.

He appealed to employers to comply with the "Pancasila industrial relations," respect workers' rights and maintain industrial harmony to prevent labor disputes, riots and strikes in their estates.

He warned that industrial strikes and riots would cause losses both to managements and workers. He said that managements should learn from the recent rioting at a textile factory in Sumedang, West Java, which caused massive material losses to the management. Hundreds of workers burned four cars and stoned several buildings in the estate following the management's failure to pay workers their Idul Fitri holiday allowance on time.

But he stopped short of supporting the workers' one-sided action and failure to follow procedures for demanding their rights.

"The burning action was completely unjustifiable and intolerable. Workers are allowed to stay away from work to protest a management's failure to respect their rights."

Latief, who is divorced and lives with his three sons and one daughter, said he has no plans to get married again because of the time demanded by his job and children.

He acknowledged that since his appointment as minister of manpower in March 1993, he has delegated much of his private corporate authority to others within his corporation.