Bontang LNG workers demand re-employment of laid off colleagues

About 1,500 workers at PT Badak NGL, more popular known as Bontang LNG plant, have threatened the company to go on strike if it refused to rehire some 72 temporary workers who have been recently laid off as part of the company?s workers reduction program, Kaltim Post reported on Monday.

The head of the branch office of the SBSI labor organization, Zulham, said in Bontang over the weekend that the workers were forced to go on strike because the management of PT Badak insisted to go ahead with the layoff plan.

"The company only sees the layoff from business orientation while we see it from human survival," he said, adding that the labor organization had told the local police about the plan to carry out a rally against the dismissal.

The rally would be attended by a number of labor leaders including the SBSI chairman Mukhtar Pakpahan, Zulham said.

Despite demanding PT Badak to hire the 72 temporary workers who previously worked at Service Department Store Housing and Recreation, the SBSI also asked the company to reemploy some 15 workers who had been laid off from its electrical maintenance department. (*)