Multa Fidrus, Tangerang – More than a thousand factory workers in Banten face an uncertain future after two manufacturing firms where they have been working for years made moves to sever contracts this weekend.
PT Rahma Shinta, a doll producer on Jl. Raya Serang kilometer 71, in the Cikande district of Serang regency has halted all production activities and closed the factory doors due to financial difficulties the company has not been able to surmount in the past months.
The company management has asked 700 workers to stay home for the time being and wait for better conditions.
Saturday might be the last day these employees will enter the shop, to wait in line their turn to receive the rest of their unpaid wages for December.
"We are taking the rest of our December salary. We were only paid 20 percent in December so today we are waiting for the remaining 80 percent," worker Agus Kusandi told The Jakarta Post.
He said in the last months of 2008, company management began frequently postponing salary disbursements. "For January pay, the management has promised to pay workers' salaries on March 13 and it is still unclear when February salaries will be paid," he said, adding he and fellow workers still had no idea what to do to make a living.
The absence of purchase orders is the main reason management decided to halt production and ask employees to stay home.
Bambang E.T., Rahma Shinta's human resources manager, said contracts with 700 of their workers had been severed.
"We can no longer extend their contracts because we just don't have any orders. For the time being, we'll probably have to shut down the factory and wait for the situation to improve," he said.
He said if the situation does turn around, their workers will be called back to work, adding the management would do their best concerning the dismissal settlement.
Another Serang employer, PT Parkland World Indonesia, shoe producer for Nike and Adidas, has reportedly sent some 500 workers home for similar reasons. No one in the management group could be reach for confirmation Saturday.
Maya Agung Dewandir, a worker at Serang's branch of Indonesian Labor Union (SPN) said she had yet to receive workers reports affirming their dismissal as of Saturday. "Even so, we will be ready to bridge the workers' unfulfilled rights with the company management," she said.
Separately, 400 workers at PT Febrido Intiprima, a textile manufacturing company in Cikupa Tangerang, staged a rally at the factory compound to demand that management increase pay rates in line with the regency's minimum wage.
"The regency's recommended minimum monthly wage is Rp 1,055,000 (US$87) but the company only pays its workers Rp 1,010,850 a month," Achmad Supriyadi, Tangerang's SPN chair said.