(Fwd) Shoe Factory closed for the weekend after 4,000 stage wa

[Curtis Price <cansv@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

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Date:          Sat, 26 Apr 1997 12:44:45 -0700
From:          NewsHound <speak@xxxxxxxxx>
To:            cansv@xxxxxxxxxxx
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Subject:       Shoe Factory closed for the weekend after 4,000 stage wage protest



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Posted at 10:47 a.m. PDT Saturday, April 26, 1997
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Shoe Factory closed for the weekend after 4,000 stage wage protest

By Ali Kotarumalos
Associated Press Writer


JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) -- Officials ordered a factory that makes Nike
shoes shut down Saturday after >>workers<< burned cars and ransacked its
offices, saying the company wasn't paying them a $2.50 a day minimum wage.

Almost half the factory's 10,000 employees took part in Friday's
demonstration at Tangerang, an industrial town outside Jakarta, according
to Indonesian media.

It was the second protest in a week against PT Hardaya Aneka Shoe Industry,
which owns the factory that makes shoes under contract for Nike Inc.

Two women were hospitalized after police broke up the melee, in which
protesters burned two cars and smashed windows, doors and furniture at the
factory, according to the Republika newspaper . Several police officers and
soldiers suffered minor injuries. No arrests were reported.

A factory official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the plant
would stay closed Saturday and Sunday, normal working days, although
production would restart Monday.

The >>workers<< complained the company was failing to pay a
government-decreed minimum wage of $2.50 a day that took effect April 1.

``They are ignoring the rights of the >>workers<< to get a decent salary,''
said Jusuf Makatita, a local labor activist.

The company denied that, saying it already was paying the higher wages and
also was providing extra benefits for its employees.

On Tuesday, 13,000 >>workers<< from the same factory and other neighboring
shoe and apparel plants held a 6-mile-long protest march to demand higher
wages.

Indonesia, which allows only one government-controlled labor union, has
been accused of holding down wages to attract foreign investment.
Independent labor organizers have been arrested, beaten and sometimes
killed.

The government acknowledges that its minimum wage is sufficient to pay only
about 90 percent of the living expenses of a single person.

Nike and its competitor Reebok have denied accusations that they pay
Indonesian >>workers<< too little and tolerate poor working conditions and
other abuses at Indonesian factories run by contractors.

Both companies have taken foreign reporters on tours of their factories,
which appeared clean and orderly. Nike refused to let the U.S. civil rights
leader Jesse Jackson visit a factory in another town near Jakarta last
July.

In southern Vietnam on Friday, about 3,000 >>workers<< unhappy with their
contract staged a one-day walkout at a Nike factory in one of the largest
>>strikes<< in the country's recent history. It was the second >>strike<<
at the Sam Yang factory in less than a month.

There was no apparent connection between the rampage in Indonesia and the
>>strike<< in Vietnam.



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