Workers Seek Revocation of Job Creation Law at May-1 Rally

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Confederation of Indonesian Workers Unions (KSPI) President Said Iqbal echoed demands, including calls to revoke the Job Creation Law, especially regarding the manpower cluster, at a rally to commemorate Labor Day or May Day 2021.

"Revoke and cancel the Job Creation Law, especially concerning the labor cluster," Iqbal remarked at the Monas area on Saturday.

The workers perceive the new regulation as being disadvantageous since they could be outsourced for life or indefinitely.

Iqbal stated that contract employees will continue to be recurring contract workers.

Furthermore, the workers' wages are low owing to the removal of the district and city sectoral minimum wages (UMSK), and so, the district and city minimum wages are generally set by governors.

"For instance, in Bekasi, the UMSK 2020 was recorded at 5.2 million and the figure reduced to 4.9 million in 2021, which means that the workers' wages in 2021 decreased since the UMSK was removed," he remarked.

Hence, Iqbal said the workers had demanded that the UMSK be re-enforced.

At the commemoration of Labor Day, Indonesian workers held a rally in which the participants comprised representatives of the KSPI and the Confederation of All Indonesian Workers Unions (KSPSI), and the University Students' Executive Boards (BEM) from universities across Indonesia.

The KSPSI had earlier spoken of not massively deploying the masses of workers to the streets on International Labor Day on May 1, 2021, on account of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

"We decided for May Day 2021 to not hold a massive mass action akin to the previous years, as we do not want to create a new cluster," KSPSI President Andi Gani Nena Wea had noted in a written statement in Jakarta, Thursday (Apr 29).

The protestors marched to the Constitutional Court (MK) building and to the State Palace to submit the May Day 2021 Petition.

Read: Police Close Jakarta Roads on May Day

ANTARA