Workers' freedom
Workers' freedom
Authorities in this country showed a stubborn reluctance to
recognize workers' rights right up until President B.J. Habibie
signed up to the International Labor Organization (ILO)
convention on June 5. The convention guarantees workers the
freedom to organize.
Under Soeharto, the authorities cut back workers rights and
the police clamped down heavily on underground unions and any
signs of labor unrest. This policy seems to have been spurred by
the ghost of the communist labor union, which haunted former
president Sukarno's government right up until the Indonesian
Communist Party was banned in 1965. Left-wing unions were so
strong and so well-organized that they were able to disrupt many
important social and economic activities and mentally terrorize
anti-Communist groups.
However, the subsequent emasculation of workers' activities
was lamented as a national disaster, not only by many people at
home, but also by democratic countries around the world. Under
the clampdown on unions authorities curtailed the workers' right
to strike, a ban which lasted right up until five years ago. The
lengthy absence of this basic freedom from the country's labor
relations perhaps goes some way toward explaining why today's
minimum monthly wage in the Jakarta area stands at a meager Rp
172,000 (US$13), far too small to provide for even the most basic
of basic needs.
To compound the difficulties faced by workers, certain
agencies with no responsibility for labor relations saw to it
that they became involved in every labor dispute, and often used
force and aggression to do so. In circumstances such as these,
Marsinah, a female labor activist, was mysteriously tortured and
murdered in East Java in 1993, in a case which attracted
worldwide attention. Police had forgotten about this case until
last week, when the reform movement vociferously reminded them of
their duty to track down those involved in the murder.
Workers' conditions did not even improve in the final years of
Soeharto's government after the Cold War had come to an end and
the specter of communism was no longer a threat. They continued
to be denied the right to set up their own unions, and the
government-backed All-Indonesia Workers Union Federation (FSPSI)
did nothing to defend their interests, indeed employers
representatives often formed the leadership of that ineffectual
organization.
In April 1992 a group of activists set up the independent
Indonesian Prosperous Labor Union (SBSI). It was banned by the
government two years later and many of its active members,
including chairman Muchtar Pakpahan, were persecuted. Pakpahan
was later jailed by a kangaroo court. He was released last week.
Workers are always the first and worst casualties in any
social or economic crisis. The hardship which they suffer is
comparable only to that of peasant farmers, who are at the mercy
of those in the government who set the price for their crops.
However, for those who wish to see an improvement in the lot
of this country's workers there is cause for optimism. President
B.J. Habibie has signed up to the ILO convention on workers'
rights to organize, and the House of Representatives will shortly
debate, with a view to ratifying, conventions on migrant workers,
discrimination in employment, and minimum wages. These will all
help to return basic rights to our workers and strengthen their
bargaining position, an essential move given that over 50 percent
of our 90 million workforce is now underemployed.
Providing workers with a better deal will improve our image
abroad -- an image that has frequently been tarnished by the
mistreatment of workers, both in the country and overseas. In the
words of Minister of Manpower Fahmi Idris: "Up until now we have
been regarded as a country which does not support the protection
of human rights and fails to give freedom to our workers."