East Kutai govt denies putting a pressure on KPC management
Monday, July 17 2000 - 02:00 AM WIB
East Kutai Regent Awang Faroek denied allegations that his government and the local House of Representatives had intervened and put a pressure on the management of East Kalimantan coal giant PT Kaltim Prima Coal (KPC) in settling dispute with a group of employees.
"The government has no intention to intervene or put a pressure on the company. We only want to help seek the best way out, because it's no longer a problem between KPC and the employees, but it has involved the reputation of this regent," Awang told the local Kaltim Post daily.
He explained that the East Kutai administration and the local parliament were only playing a mediator role in the efforts to settle the labor dispute. He said that so far the efforts went well as the protesting employees agreed to end their control over the company's production facilities, allowing KPC to resume production.
Awang was responding to a protest by another group of KPC employees accusing the East Kutai administration of pressuring the management and of taking sides in the negotiation process.
KPC has some 2,600 employees. Around 600 of them are grouped in the SBSI labor union, while the remainder are grouped in the SPSI labor union and Korpra.
The employees from the SBSI group held a demonstration and a strike for a month since June 14 including by taking control of certain key production facilities of KPC, causing the company to be unable to make production. The protesting employees demanded, among other things, a 15 percent increase in salary.
A negotiation facilitated by the East Kutai administration at the local parliament building resulted with the protesting employees agreeing to end their control over the production facilities, while the company agreed to revoke its earlier decision to fire 66 of the protesting hundreds of protesting employees. The company would only give the 66 employees a strong warning for violating company regulation.
But another group of employees, from the SPSI and the Korpra groups, protested last week, accusing East Kutai government of taking sides by giving too much favor to the employees of the SBSI union.
Another round of negotiation is scheduled for today (Monday) which would now include representatives of the SPSI and Korpra groupings.
The employees from the SBSI union, supported by Awang Faroek, want the company to also drop its warning letter to the 66 employees, while the labors from the SPSI union want the management to maintain the sanction against the 66 employees. (*)