Garment sector: Protests go on in spite of wage rise

03 April 2013
By Mom Kunthear
The Phnom Penh Post
Garment sector

Four days after the Labour Advisory Committee approved a monthly minimum wage increase to $75 starting in May, more than 500 workers at the Su Tong Fang garment factory yesterday demanded that their company begin the wage increase one month early.

Chea Sophat, president of the Cambodian Rights Workers Union Federation, said workers striking in front of the factory asked that the company offer holiday bonuses, seniority benefits and several other perks.

The factory, however, rejected the workers’ requests, Sophat said. “They said they have to follow the government and LAC announcement that the new wages will start in May.”

Worker Sreng Sok Kim said yesterday that workers would continue striking until their demands were met.

Vong Sovann, deputy secretary general of the Social Affairs Ministry’s Committee for Settlement of Strikes, said he was not concerned that protests were still occurring, noting that demands for holiday benefits were common each year before Khmer New Year

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