Labour Day marked across Asia

International Workers’ Day was marked on May 1 across several Asian countries with rallies, marches and special events.  Here are a few:

CAMBODIA

In Cambodia, riot police watched carefully as more than 1,000 garment workers defied a government ban on marching to deliver a petition to the National Assembly in Phnom Penh, demanding a higher minimum wage and more freedom of assembly.  The marchers, holding a forest of banners, filled a street a short distance from the parliament complex and advanced noisily until they were stopped by a barricade and lines of police, holding batons, shields and guns capable of firing gas canisters. A standoff of several hours was resolved when a representative from the Assembly came out and accepted the petition.

The workers were from the Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers Democratic Union. Among their demands was increasing the minimum wage from $153 to $208 per month. The clothing and footwear industry is Cambodia's biggest export earner.

The major Cambodian labor unions traditionally have been loosely allied with opposition parties, posing a potential political threat to longtime authoritarian leader Hun Sen.

 

PHILIPPINES

In the Philippines, a few thousand left-wing activists and labourers marched and held noisy rallies in the capital to press for higher wages and an end to temporary contractual jobs that deprive workers of many benefits. In sweltering summer heat, the crowds in Manila also protested alleged extrajudicial killings under President Rodrigo Duterte's drug crackdown.

The activists carried murals of Duterte and President Donald Trump, asking the Philippine leader to stay away from the U.S. president, who has invited Duterte for a U.S. visit. Protest leader Venzer Crisostomo fears an ``America First'' policy would be disadvantageous to poorer countries like the Philippines.

 

TAIWAN

In Taipei, thousands of Taiwanese workers hoisted cardboard signs and banners in a march protesting what they said were unfairly low wages and deteriorating work conditions. A number of them staged a fake funeral procession, carrying a coffin with the words ``basic annual pension'' written on it, while others waved black flags.

Huang Yu-kai, president of the labor union of the Taiwan High-Speed Rail Corp. and a train conductor, said low wages in Taiwan are ``the root of all problems.''   ``This is why we take part in this march every year,'' Huang said.

President Tsai Ing-wen said in a post on her Facebook page that improvements are being made even if major changes would take time. ``Although reform would not be completed in one step, the progress we have made is not small.''

 

BANGLADESH

Thousands of garment industry workers in the impoverished South Asian nation gathered to demand better wages and legal protection.

About 4 million people are employed in the country's garment industry, the second largest in the world. The industry, with about 4,000 factories, earns $25 billion a year from exports, mainly to the United States and Europe, but working conditions often are grim.

Lovely Yesmin, president of the Readymade Garments Workers Federation, one of several unions representing factory workers, said just increasing salaries is not enough. She said workers must be provided better living quarters and health benefits, and factories must make provisions so the children of factory workers can be educated.   ``These are our demands on the great May Day of 2017,'' she said.