Tangerang – Hundreds of workers laid off by detergent producer PT Sinar Antjol in Manis Industrial Estate in Curug, Tangerang regency staged a protest Thursday, demanding the management rehire them and pay them the regency's minimum wage.

Before the rally, the demonstrators, who had been outsourced employees with the company, stormed the factory and forced newly hired workers to go home.

Labor union chairman Eko Santoso said they forced the new workers out because the regency's Manpower and Transmigration Agency had nullified the contracts of the new employees and had advised the company's management to rehire its old workers.

"We will stop all newly recruited workers from entering the factory because our dismissal and the new hiring are against the 2003 Labor Law," he said.