Sarawak Bank Employees Union CEO Andrew Lo has claimed that workers in the state are poised to picket on Labour Day (May 1) to protest delays to the Sarawak Labour Ordinance (SLO) amendments.
According to Lo, workers are dismayed that the Sarawak government has yet to agree to the amendments because the administration said it must be consulted before any amendments are made.
However, Lo said this was already done.
“The fact that the state government was consulted for the 2005 and 2012 amendments and again for the latest amendments is proof that the state government has always been consulted and its agreement sought.
“Otherwise, the federal government would have tabled the SLO amendments together with the Employment Act (EA) in 2021.
“Likewise, it did not table the proposed amendments to the SLO in 2012 when the EA amendments were amended to provide for the prevention of sexual harassment at the workplace,” he said in a statement today.
‘SLO’s last amendment took 46 years’
Lo claimed that this was the main reason the last amendments of the SLO in 2005 took 46 years.
“It has been 12 years since the previous amendments to the Employment Act in 2012 and three years since the 2021 EA amendments.
“How does this undue delay protect the interest of workers in Sarawak? If it is really serious about protecting workers’ interests, it should push for better provisions than in the EA.
“It seems that Sarawak workers are made to pay for the quest for autonomy. Autonomy is supposed to benefit all and cannot be suffocating,” he added.
On Friday, Deputy Minister in the Sarawak Premier’s Department (Labour, Immigration & Project Monitoring) Gerawat Gala said the Sarawak government is still waiting to be consulted before the federal government makes any amendments to the SLO.
He said the consultation request is to protect the rights and interests of the workers in the state and that this has been communicated to the federal Human Resources Ministry.
Gerawat hoped that the ministry would table the amendment bill together with the amendment to the Sabah Labour Ordinance in the next parliamentary session.
Gerawat said his ministry had informed the Malaysian Trades Union Congress (MTUC) and the leaders of other worker unions in the state about the status of the amendments and that there was no need for workers to picket as it would not resolve the matter.
Lo earlier claimed that it was a travesty that workers in Kelantan, controlled by PAS for decades, could enjoy better benefits and protection than workers in the high-income state of Sarawak.
“We also wish to point out that it is Sarawak MTUC’s position as decided by its Triennial Delegate Conference, representing all affiliated unions in Sarawak, in 2022 and 2019 that the SLO must be amended without further delay and that workers’ rights should not be hijacked over constitutional quibbles,” he added. - Mkini
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