When the minimum wage battle is between people and profits, the ruling coalition will not have the courage to defy its masters.
COMMENT
By S Arutchelvan
When the government stated that the Minimum Wage Act will be announced in March, the bosses dished out threats by saying the usual things – the implementation of the Act will bankrupt the nation, more studies are needed, many factories will close down, more time is needed to implement the law and that productivity must increase first etc etc.
Previously, the bosses managed to stall the implementation of monthly wage by various means including buying time by doing more in-depth studies. Most of these studies and researches are funded by the bosses themselves to keep wages low.
They also managed to create a cheap labour policy by bringing in migrant labour as well as many laws to curb trade union activities and keep wages low so that bosses can maximise profits. They will continue to pursue policies such as the Goods and Services Tax (GST) so that corporate taxes will be brought down and the tax burden will be transferred to the people.
In the name of modernisation and development, they will privatise anything they desire, from public healthcare to public schools. All in the name of profit. These capitalist bosses have neither loyalty nor national interest. They will leave any country when they like and hold the government at ransom. The common people on the other hand don’t have much of a choice. It is a class question and it is not going to be resolved that smoothly.
I remember that during the plantation workers monthly wage struggle, the plantation bosses MAPA funded a study to establish if monthly wages is practical in the industry. When the research conducted by University Malaya (UM) lecturers revealed that the monthly wage can indeed be implemented, the study was suddenly not made public and declared an official secret till today.
This goes to show that there is no way that the big bosses are going to compromise on any rationale views when they have to compromise profits.
BN government in an odd position
Today, the BN government is in an odd position. It needs to announce the monthly wage to make the majority low paying voters happy to get their votes.
Meanwhile, it has to make sure not to piss off the bosses who may not fund their election campaigns. It is this dilemma which has kept BN from announcing the minimum wage earlier. We must remember after all the hoo-hah about monthly wage for security guards, finally it was announced between the range of RM450 till RM 550. And the joke is, it is yet to be implemented and enforced properly.
So how is the government going to get away this time, after sort of announcing that minimum wage is at RM900?
Believe me; we will hear the announcement but not the implementation date anytime soon. More studies will be conducted on the impact of this new law, most companies will not implement this law and there is no way that the Human Resource Ministry is going to enforce it.
The Malaysian Employers Federation (MEF) has craftily said that the workers will lose their benefits if the Minimum Wage Act is implemented. No way are the bosses planning to take a profit cut to make their workers happy. So minimum wage will just be another candy hanging on a string waiting for the general election.
The MEF has gone on a rampage campaign. They have enough money to buy advertisement spaces as well as funds to buy the editors.
In days to come, there is going to be more voices of opposition to the Minimum Wage Act in the hope that Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak will do another U-turn which has been a constant feature in his administration.
It must be noted that the ruling Umno-BN government has always been pro-capitalist and has used draconian measures to clamp down on workers including the use of ISA.
Huge income gap
Let me now put some discourse to this argument that a minimum wage of RM1,500 is not only a decent thing to do, we have the money to spend as well as it will spearhead our economy.
The Malaysian income per capita is RM28,000 annually which works out to be RM2,300 per month. This means if we take the average household size in Malaysia, a household in the Peninsular should be getting RM10,100 a month and in Sabah and Sarawak RM11,500 a month and RM10,800 respectively.
A minimum wage of RM1,500 will only result in a family getting around RM3,000 a month. The government’s proposal of RM900 will only mean a household income of RM1,800 per month. This is way lower than what is entitled to each household. Therefore the request is reasonable.
Now let’s take a look at the income gap. The highest 20% of Malaysians earn 51% of the total income whereby the bottom 40% earn merely 14%. The poorest 10% only control 1.7% of the total income. This is very disgraceful.
Malaysia has the highest income disparity in South East Asia and one of the highest in Asia. Syabas CEO Rozali Ismail earns around RM425,000 a month, 283 times higher than the minimum wage proposed by us (RM1,500) and 472 times more than the figure proposed by the government (RM 900).
So the argument should not be, how not to give the minimum wage for the lower income group but rather how to distribute income evenly and equally. Every human being is entitled to a decent wage, decent home life and good medical care.
Will MEF or the bosses they represent or their family members agree to a monthly pay of less than RM900? Why the double standard? Do they have extra stomachs to feed or what?
On former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s warning on the minimum wage, I can understand why Mahathir is so upset with the minimum wage. When he was the prime minister, it was reported that based on searches made at the Registrar of Companies at the end of 1994, his sons Mirzan had interests in 98 companies, Mokhzani in 48 companies and Mukhriz in 67 companies.
Imagine how much they have earned and contributed to the income gap. Mokhzani this year secured the 15th place in the nation’s 40 richest persons list with an estimated wealth valued at US$560 million (RM2.1 billion). He was in 26th place last year.
I am sure a father like Mahathir will be more concerned about his three sons than the 3.2 million workers estimated to benefit from the minimum wage.
If S’gor can, why not BN?
Recently, the Selangor government agreed to implement minimum wage of RM1,500 for all its GLCs.
In order to facilitate this, a minimum wage fund was drawn from a newly set-up Selangorku Grant totalling RM300million. This grant will assist GLCs facing problems in implementing this minimum wage of RM1,500 in Selangor.
Likewise, I don’t see why the federal government cannot assist small and medium scale industries which may face some problems in implementing this Minimum Wage Act.
When companies like Lynas can get a 12-year tax exemption, why not small and medium scale companies be given more support. The concern by some small and medium industries is valid but that does not mean that it cannot be subsidised.
The annual budget of the Selangor government is only RM1.5 billion and it can give minimum wage to all its GLCs using RM300 million. Compare this to the federal government which has a budget of around RM200 billion.
Now please compare this to the money lost in the PKFZ scandal – RM12 billion, submarine commission – RM500 milllion, Terengganu Stadium Collapse – RM292 million, MRR2 repair cost – RM70 million, worth of APs given out in a year – RM1.8 billon, Perwaja Steel – RM2.56 billion, RM 100 million for the renovation of the Parliament building and fixing leaks, National Astronaut Programme – RM40 million, RM2.4 million on indelible ink wasted in 2008, In September 2006, the government paid compensation amounting to RM38.5 billion to 20 highway concessionaires, Putra transport system bailout which cost RM4.5 billion, STAR-LRT bailout costing RM3.3 billion and RM17 billion subsidy to IPP. And I have yet to speak about former Selangor menteri Besar Dr Mohd Khir Toyo’s house and Najib’s wife, Rosmah Mansor’s diamonds.
It is estimated that RM10 to RM28 billion is lost annually because of corruption. With all this, we are crying to pay a worker a decent monthly wage of RM1,500 so that they can feed their family and live a decent life.
Paying a worker good pay will also help stimulate the economy and will bring much benefits to the lower income traders and businesses as these workers will be spending on day-to-day expenses and not on luxury items.
This will benefit a huge level of the lower strata economy and boost income of the lower income group. This will help the real economy and assist real people and not those trying to make fast money in the stock-market casinos.
The final battle is which comes first – people or profit ? Will BN have the guts to go against its political masters and implement a RM1,500 minimum wage? I don’t think so!
The writer is the secretary-general of PSM.
March 7, 2012
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