Union claims Cambodians ‘working to death'
18/08/2014
More alarmingly, it adds that garment workers are dying at work.
Sokny Say from IndustriALL Global Union affiliate, the Free Trade Union of Workers of the Kingdom of Cambodia (FTUWKC), said: "2014 is remarkable because while we have had many cases of mass faintings in the past, this is the first year that people have died. We must not become immune to the fact that so many garment workers are collapsing in the factories. It can be a precursor to death."
Two workers employed at factories located outside Phnom Penh died at the end of July after being overworked, insinuates IndustriALL. However, when contacted by the group, the factory claims it was due to medical carelessness at the hospital where they were receiving treatment.
IndustriALL’s general secretary, Jyrki Raina, said: “This sinister development of workers collapsing at work and then dying cannot go unchallenged. Poverty wages mean that garment workers cannot afford to eat properly and a lack of food, long hours and intolerable factory conditions are proving a lethal combination.
“We continue to back Cambodian unions’ demands for a raise in the minimum wage so garment workers can afford enough food to live on and no longer have to work such punishing overtime hours to survive.”
Share this story:
