Sok Rathana, 19, has been a domestic worker in Cambodia for two years, working 100 hours a month for $70 while attending high school. Her family is poor, and her mother also is a domestic worker.
As in many countries, domestic workers in Cambodia are not covered by labor laws and so have no minimum wage, safety and health protections or other basic employment benefits.
As Sok says, “I don’t think I have full rights as a domestic worker.”
Brazil workers and their unions are outraged and vowing further protests over a draconian labor law reform the Senate passed yesterday that will weaken labor regulations as well as restrict financing for unions.
The law, which President Michel Temer supports and is expected to sign, will remove all restrictions on outsourcing, dismantle labor rights, including provisions on vacations, overtime and working hours, give more freedom to employers to negotiate individually with workers rather than collectively through unions, and eliminate the “union tax” paid by all formal-sector workers, which is the principal form of financing for union activities in Brazil.
Workers across Brazil rallied over the past weeks to urge lawmakers to vote against the so-called labor law reform bill, which will mean “lay-offs, end of formal employment and legalization of freelancers,” says Central Union of Workers (CUT) President Vagner Freitas.
“The problem already begins with the name, the lie that there is around [it],” Sérgio Nobre, secretary-general of CUT told thousands of metalworkers gathered in São Paulo on Tuesday. “‘Reform’ gives the impression that it is a good thing.” Nobre said the law would serve the interests of large multinational companies, not workers.
Workers across Brazil launched a 24-hour general strike in April, after the lower house approved the bill. Brazil’s Congress debated the law without the participation of CUT or any trade union opposed to its provisions, says Nobre.
Young people, specifically young black workers, will be especially harmed, because young workers are primarily employed in precarious jobs and are the majority of the unemployed, Julia Reis Nogueira, CUT national secretary of racial equality said in May.
Senators opposed to the bill tried to block the vote with a sit-in at the Senate president’s rostrum, but the session resumed after a six-hour delay and lawmakers passed the law by 50-26.
Kymbat Sherimbayeva was born in Naryn Oblast, a mountainous and very cold region of Kyrgyzstan where most people support themselves through cattle breeding. Seven years ago, 18-year-old Sherimbayeva left her village for Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan’s capital, seeking work.
Youth un- and underemployment stands at 55 percent in Kyrgyzstan. Most young people feel forced to migrate to Kazakhstan, Korea, Russia, Turkey or other countries in search of work, but some young people like Sherimbayeva hope to build their futures closer to home.
After arriving in Bishkek, Sherimbayeva found a job as a knitter at a hosiery factory, where she was soon promoted to head of quality control.
While working at the factory, Sherimbayeva says, she and her some 200 coworkers—of whom 90 percent are between the ages of 18 and 25—became increasingly concerned about inadequate wages and poor safety and health conditions.
With the help of trainings provided by the Garment Workers’ Union of Kyrgyzstan, with Solidarity Center support, workers at the factory realized they could negotiate improvements with management much more effectively as a group than as individuals. “We are stronger when we are together,” says Sherimbayeva.
Workers identified several activist leaders, including Sherimbayeva, who helped organize their coworkers into a union local. This year, workers are negotiating their first agreement with their employer, focusing on better wages and benefits. Sherimbayeva says that workers’ need higher wages because the average monthly salary of $200 does not cover basic expenses. She also hopes to help achieve for her co-workers paid sick leave and a year-end bonus, which are common to workers in Kyrgyzstan but not available to workers at their factory.
Since she and her co-workers organized, Sherimbayeva says they have found it much easier to negotiate improvements with factory management, even before a formal agreement is in effect. For example, in consultation with the union, factory management developed safety instructions for all departments and trained workers on those procedures; hired a local occupational safety and health service; provided protective clothing and other personal safety equipment; and now displays occupational safety and health information in prominent places throughout the factory building.
“Our position is much stronger concerning our labor as well as human rights. Together, we are able to defend workers in a much more effective way,” she says.
Lack of job protections, combined with the invisibility of their work, means many domestic workers toil long hours in unsafe conditions without a minimum wage or access to health care, sick leave or pensions. In Cambodia, domestic workers, who are not recognized as workers under national labor law or protected by Association of Southeast Asian Nations ASEAN) agreements, are pushing their government to guarantee minimum labor standards.
Nearly 100 domestic workers rallied recently in Phnom Penh in support of International Labor Organization (ILO) Convention 189 on Decent Work for Domestic Workers. The convention, which mandates regular working hours, fair pay and access to social benefit programs, is an important international standard for domestic workers who seek decent work. The Association of Cambodian Domestic Workers (ACDW), the Cambodian Domestic Workers Network (CDWN) and the Solidarity Center jointly organized the event to celebrate International Domestic Workers’ Day on June 16.
The domestic workers’ unions also have debuted a documentary that examines issues arising from domestic workers’ precarious job status, with workers telling their own stories. For example, Hang Sothea, 47 and divorced, is the mother of eight children. To support her family, she has cleaned houses since 2010, working 180 hours for two employers each month—for a total wage of $170.
Another domestic worker featured in the video, Sok Rathana, 19, has been working as a domestic worker for two years while she attends high school. Explaining how she followed her mother into the profession she says: “I think I’m not good enough to do other jobs, but I can do most of the house work.” Rathana receives $70 a month for her work.
A recent survey of Cambodian domestic workers underscores how lack of legal protection can lead to exploitation for domestic workers. Of the 600 workers interviewed, 60 percent make less than $50 a month and 83 percent report being uninsured. Many say they are forced to work overtime. Even among workers who report having asked for overtime, 18 percent say they never received compensation for those hours. The nonprofit Center for Policy Studies conducted the survey, with Solidarity Center support.
Through organizations like ACDW, CDWN and the International Domestic Workers Federation (IDWF), which coordinates domestic workers globally to push for passage of Convention 189, Cambodian domestic workers have been petitioning the government for formal recognition of their rights. They say ratification of Convention 189 is a necessary first step toward covering the gaps in Cambodia labor laws and regional agreements that have deprived domestic workers of their worker rights.
Amin Yeleusinov, chairman of the Oil Construction Company union, was sentenced to two years in prison on politically motivated embezzlement charges and fined $26,300, according to Human Rights Watch. Yeleusinov, 55, is banned from engaging in any trade union activities for five years.
Authorities attempted to make Yeleusinov sign a false confession, and he has fallen ill due to the conditions in his prison cell and the harsh detention regime, according to the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).
Nurbek Kushakbayev, KNPRK deputy president, was sentenced to two years prison in a corrective labor colony and fined $80,000. The OCC demanded the fines to pay for “harm” caused to the company. Human rights organizations say the trials were not conducted with due process and evidence acquitting the men was repressed.
Yeleusinov’s conviction is the latest development in an ongoing crackdown on independent labor movement in Kazakhstan, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW), and part of an overall spate of “attacks, harassment and prosecutions as Kazakhstan’s embattled civil society continues to be targeted for exercising fundamental rights.”
The country adopted an onerous trade union law in 2014 that marginalized independent unions in favor of a government-controlled federation. Beginning in 2015, the Kazak government began denying registration of unions in the oil, health, construction, media and education sectors along with regional union bodies, as well as the national independent trade confederation. (See the HRW report on violations of workers’ rights in Kazakhstan.)
‘Foreign Investors Should Recognize Kazakhstan’s Attacks on Workers’
The ITUC has lodged a formal complaint with the International Labor Organization over the union leaders’ imprisonment and over the government’s refusal to recognize the rights of workers to form independent trade unions.
Last month, Kazakhstan hosted an international exposition featuring the theme, “future energy,” a high-profile event expected to draw 3 million visitors, including global wealth leaders. Events like EXPO 2017 “should not distract from the serious human rights problems in Kazakhstan, or from the human costs of the government’s repressive policies,” according to Mihra Rittmann, an HRW researcher in Central Asia.
“Foreign investors–many of whom recognize the importance of upholding international labor standards–should take note that while the government claimed it was creating a better system of social partnerships and modernizing trade unions, the reality is that they decimated Kazakhstan’s independent trade union movement,” says Rittmann.
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