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13 June, 2001The ILO Workers' Group charges that the Indonesian government has acquiesced in the use of violence against workers.
GENEVA: The ILO's annual International Labour Conference, presently meeting in Geneva, has denounced "repeated violations of core conventions of the International Labour Organisation by the Indonesian authorities".
A statement adopted by the Workers' Group charges that the Indonesian government "has acquiesced in the use of violence against workers" and "has failed to carry out the task of facilitating fair and just resolution of industrial disputes".
The statement refers specifically to a dispute at the Jakarta Shangri-La Hotel, where 600 trade union members were dismissed by management, which offered to give them back their jobs if they accepted to withdraw from their trade union. Management then locked out the union members for three months and reopened the hotel on March 17 with a non-unionised workforce.
Details of the case were brought to the attention of the Workers' Group meeting by Maureen Fransesca Elizabeth, who chairs the Shangri-La union's women's committee. "On March 17, as we protested against the reopening of the hotel, some 500 soldiers attacked workers, wounding 20 demonstrators, including a pregnant woman who miscarried in the hospital as a result of the beating," she told workers' delegates, deploring that the authorities had decided to side with management and participate in the anti-union offensive.
A statement adopted by the Workers' Group charges that the Indonesian government "has acquiesced in the use of violence against workers" and "has failed to carry out the task of facilitating fair and just resolution of industrial disputes".
The statement refers specifically to a dispute at the Jakarta Shangri-La Hotel, where 600 trade union members were dismissed by management, which offered to give them back their jobs if they accepted to withdraw from their trade union. Management then locked out the union members for three months and reopened the hotel on March 17 with a non-unionised workforce.
Details of the case were brought to the attention of the Workers' Group meeting by Maureen Fransesca Elizabeth, who chairs the Shangri-La union's women's committee. "On March 17, as we protested against the reopening of the hotel, some 500 soldiers attacked workers, wounding 20 demonstrators, including a pregnant woman who miscarried in the hospital as a result of the beating," she told workers' delegates, deploring that the authorities had decided to side with management and participate in the anti-union offensive.