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24 July, 2024Nine months have passed since the government of Bangladesh revised the minimum wage, yet the country’s working people continue to face hardships due to a high rate of inflation coupled with extremely low wages.
With inflation hovering above nine per cent, purchasing power of working people in Bangladesh continues to decline. Last year in November, the government increased the minimum wage of an-entry level garment worker from BDT8,000(US$67) to BDT12,500(US$ 105) half of what unions demanded.
In response to the wage increment which was more in line with what the owners of garment factories had proposed, workers and their unions organized massive protest in Dhaka. Workers’ protest was met with brutal police action where at least four workers were killed and several others gravely injured. Police also filed criminal cases against protesting workers and trade union leaders.
IndustriALL’s affiliates inform that at least 43 criminal cases were filed against 20,000 workers and more than a hundred workers were incarcerated in the aftermath of the minimum wage protest. Many of these workers have lost their jobs and employers have blacklisted them making it harder for them to find new employment.
Trade unions, including IndustriALL’s affiliates, are demanding that the continued harassment against workers be stopped immediately, all criminal charges be dropped, and workers be adequately compensated, including the families of those workers who were killed during police action.
Unions are also raising the issue of workers being unable to maintain a decent standard of living given their poverty wages combined with high prices of essential commodities. Last month, IndustriALL’s affiliates organized a press conference to demand that government allocate resources to provide a food ration to garment workers which provide essential food items at cheaper prices. The conference was held after the budget session of the parliament in which a ration was not allocated for garment workers despite promises made by the prime minister last year.
Shahidul Badal, general secretary of IndustriALL Bangladesh Council, says:
“The declared minimum wage for the RMG sector should be implemented throughout the industry without any delay and all the criminal cases filed against workers must be immediately dropped.”
IndustriALL’s affiliates are also demanding that the revised minimum wage be strictly implemented across all garment factories in the country.
Photo credit: Crozet M. / ILO