SBY On Recent Labor Unrest

From The Jakarta Post:

“Moral-wise, labor wages should be appropriate to meet the sense of justice,” Yudhoyono told journalists during an impromptu press conference at the Presidential Office on Wednesday.

“If our economy and business world continues to grow, then labor wages should go up in line with that growths,” he said.  The President also said that all local administrations at the regency and city levels should take a share of responsibility in handling disputes concerning labor’s minimum wages in several regions.

“The tri-partite regional wage council [in each region], which consist of representatives from the local administration, businesspeople and labor unions, must be able to address the issue properly. The council knows the life costs in regions, thus, they should know how much the minimum wage in each region should be,” Yudhoyono said.

“Don’t let the disputes be ridden by other interests. I hope this matter is free from any kind of political interests,” he went on.

Coins For President SBY

As I mentioned in a previous post, there has been a prominent public debate about whether President SBY deserves a raise after he pointed out in a speech that he had not received a raise since he came into office seven years ago, and later the unveiling of a proposal to increase the President’s salary this year.

This, in turn, has led to a series of demonstrations and calls for “coin collections for SBY,” in which people can pass the hat to help out SBY with his stagnant salary.  One recent tongue-in-cheek collection was conducted in Cimahi by the labor union Serikat Buruh Sejahtera Indonesia (SBSI) 1992.  50 workers from the union stood at an intersection collecting coins from motorists.  One organizer of the protest said the union planned to give the money to SBY directly and hoped that the President’s performance would be improved with the extra income.

A representative of the Presidents Partai Demokrat denounced the coin collection demonstrations as unproductive and representing cynicism in politics.