MTUC sec-gen: Penjana has goodies for bosses, doesn't help jobless workers

Malaysian Trades Union Congress (MTUC) secretary-general J Solomon said that the short-term economic recovery plan (Penjana) unveiled by Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin was laden with goodies for the business community but failed to live up to promises on protecting workers.

"The MTUC fears that similar to the previous Prihatin stimulus packages, Penjana will fail to live up to its lofty promises on ensuring workers are protected, especially the thousands who have been laid off despite employers benefiting from massive government assistance in interest-free loans, outright grants and wage subsidies," said Solomon (photo, above) in a statement today.

He also blasted the Perikatan Nasional government's incorporation of Socso funds into the package.

"We also note that Penjana will involve additional disbursement of RM5 billion from Socso funds to provide wage subsidies to employers.

"Furthermore, Socso will now be required to provide subsidies to employers who recruit unemployed workers and even pay up to RM4,000 to those who are under job training.

"Needless to say, all of this will greatly impact Socso’s bottom line and more importantly, its long and mid-term ability to provide a social safety net for workers," he added.

Solomon also took the government to task over what he said was a lack of transparency.

MTUC’s biggest fear concerning Penjana is the scant details the government has offered on ensuring transparency in disbursing the billions of ringgit allocated for the business community.

He said the government had failed to divulge any information on its plans to ensure that employers who benefit from Penjana, live up to their end of the bargain by ensuring workers keep their jobs and that the subsidies meant for workers goes to them and not elsewhere.

"In all the earlier three Prihatin packages totalling more than RM250 billion ringgit, neither the government nor Bank Negara made public any details on who received the massive amount of public money by way of financial assistance and wage subsidies that were dished out to businesses, especially SMEs," he said.

Solomon added that MTUC’s demand that the finance minister and Bank Negara publish a list of these beneficiaries for the sake of public transparency has been ignored time and again.

"What the public and MTUC do know is that despite all the handouts to the business community, thousands of workers have been rendered jobless and the Malaysian Employers Federation has warned that more than two million workers will be unemployed in the coming weeks.

"Despite the billions poured in to help businesses, Malaysia is heading into recession in the next four to six months, according to the Statistics Department.

Thus, the MTUC has to treat the objectives laid out in Penjana with caution and apprehension until the issue of public transparency is addressed.

Solomon said that while Muhyiddin has declared that more than 83 percent of the workforce or nearly 13 million workers have returned to their jobs, there was research by online recruiters JobStreet saying its research showed that one in every five Malaysians have lost their job since the Covid-19 outbreak.

Solomon also alleged that many workers who lost their jobs were in fact victims of unscrupulous employers, despite the fact that some of them are blue-chip companies and international conglomerates.

"The Labour Department’s failure to crack down on such employers have spurred others to follow suit.

"Unless there is a concerted attempt to crack down on these employers, they will simply continue to pocket the financial assistance from the Prihatin and Penjana packages while sacking workers at every opportunity," said Solomon. - Mkini