the blogging syed shahir

The Star

PETALING JAYA: The MTUC is calling on the authorities to implement effective measures to protect all frontline workers, especially those from the aviation and healthcare sectors, against the influenza A(H1N1) virus.

MTUC president Syed Shahir Syed Mohamud said employers must also be committed to giving assistance to workers who have been placed under home or hospital quarantine as well as their families.

“If clinic staff or airport workers and flight attendants are quarantined for coming in contact with the two infected patients, they should be paid the full salary,” said Syed Shahir.

“We are very concerned with the outbreak of various diseases in several parts of the country and want the authorities to seriously look into practices associated with the preservation of good health among the general public,” he said.

Syed Shahir expressed the hope that employers would educate workers on how to improve personal hygiene and keeping their work environment clean at all times.

In Port Klang, port workers expressed concern for the lack of protective measures against the virus outbreak, reports Bernama.

Union of Employees of Port Ancillary Services Supplies (Unepass) secretary A. Balasubramaniam said thousands of frontliners serving incoming ships from all over the world had not been given adequate protection.

The Health Ministry, he claimed, was concentrating more on airports and other passenger entry points and gave low priority to ports.

“There are no screening machines or stringent health checks at the ports, thus workers and ship crew are coming in contact with each other without proper screening,” he said, adding it was causing concern to the port community now that Malaysia had two confirmed cases of influenza A(H1N1).

Balasubramaniam, who is also MTUC vice-president, called on the ministry not to neglect the health and welfare of port workers and issue proper guidelines and information to them.

He said the port authorities and the Health Department needed to conduct intensive campaigns among port workers to increase awareness on the disease and other communicable diseases that could be brought into the country by foreign ship crew members.

By : B. Suresh Ramand S. Arulldas (NST)

PETALING JAYA: The Malaysian Trades Union Congress (MTUC) wants the workers’ demands to be seriously looked into and solutions implemented.
For starters, the congress which turns 60 this year wants to meet Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak who assumed the country’s leadership recently.

“The MTUC is prepared to have a dialogue with the new leadership on workers’ issues,” said congress president Syed Shahir Syed Mohamud after attending the MTUC national-level Workers Day celebrations at the Subang Jaya Municipal Council Sports Complex here yesterday.

He added that the current government leadership should be “caring” to the workers’ needs in the country.

Both Syed Shahir and MTUC secretary-general G. Rajasekaran were of the view that there were several crucial issues which need to be addressed to improve the welfare and the well-being of the 11.2 million workers nationwide.
In an oath taken by about 1,500 MTUC members, they asked for among others:

- Removal of threats and oppression of workers;

- Implement workers’ rights in line with the provision in the Federal Constitution;

- Recognise and adopt the 1998 International Labour Organisation resolution by reinstating the right of negotiation with the civil service;

- Create a law guaranteeing a minimum wage of RM900;

- Respect workers’ rights by ceasing all kinds of discrimination;

- Expand the social protection net to workers who lose their jobs;

- Review outdated labour laws; and,

- Respect occupational safety and health of workers by enhancing awareness of the relevant laws.

Meanwhile, both Syed Shahir and Rajasekaran also want the immediate setting up of a retrenchment fund.

“This is more important now due to the uncertain economic situation,” said Rajasekaran.

Syed Shahir called for the government to set aside RM500 million to set up the fund.

“We have been asking for the fund to be set up for the last 10 years. It is only for those who have lost their jobs and for no other purpose,” he said, adding that the fund should be set up immediately.

Syed Shahir said that if workers were truly the backbone of the country’s progress and development, then their rights need to be acted and implemented upon.

In Penang , the state MTUC asked the government to help workers currently displaced and retrenched by their respective employers to find alternative jobs.

More than 100 workers, especially displaced and retrenched workers, took part in a one-kilometre walk from the Penang Bird Park to the Sunway township.

The participants also distributed more than 3,000 leaflets containing the MTUC’s recent demands to the government.

PRESS RELEASE

1 May 2009

In observance of 1st May, Labour Day, Pesticide Action Network Asia and the Pacific (PAN AP) reveals its initial findings on community monitoring of pesticide use and practices that indicate adverse impacts on agricultural workers, peasants and farmers, and appeals to governments of Asian developing countries to address the impacts of pesticides on workers’ health.

Around 25 million agricultural workers are being poisoned in developing countries according to the 1990 WHO World Health Statistics Quarterly. “However, such figures reflect only the most severe cases, and are likely to significantly underestimate unintentional pesticide poisonings, because they are based primarily on hospital registries.” says Dr. Meriel Watts, PAN Aotearoa New Zealand. She furthers, “Underreporting is endemic in all countries but especially in the poorer ones where few workers have access to medical personnel, and often symptoms are not recognised by either victims or medical personnel as resulting from pesticides.”

“The availability and unrelenting use of highly hazardous pesticides including WHO Class 1 pesticides by agricultural workers, peasants and farmers clearly shows how governments are more concerned with the industries making profit than the labourers’ rights to health and, safe working conditions and environment.” says Sarojeni V. Rengam, Executive Director of PAN AP. She adds, “The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation’ s Code of Conduct has been in place since 1985 and it is really disturbing to find out that inappropriate incentives or gifts continue to be given out to encourage the purchase of pesticides, especially highly hazardous pesticides.”

PAN AP’s report entitled “Community Monitoring of Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (SAICM) Implementation on Pesticide Use and Practices” is a compilation of studies implemented by eleven organisations in eight Asian countries – Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Sri Lanka and Vietnam. 1306 respondents were interviewed and more than 118 retail stores were surveyed, with 55 human health incident reports gathered.

Based on the initial findings, PAN AP recommends the development of a global partnership to rapidly reduce and eliminate highly hazardous pesticides and for governments and industry to ensure that pesticides that require Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) are not registered, sold or used in developing countries in which the conditions of use are such that these pesticides can not be used safely, in particular because of a lack of, or inadequacy in, or inability to purchase PPE.

The report indicates that:

1. Highly hazardous pesticides are being used at diverse sites throughout Asia. 51% of respondents from Thrissur, Kerala (India) have used methyl parathion (WHO Class 1a) and 36% of respondents from Cambodia have used pesticides containing monocrotophos (WHO Class 1) that is banned in the country.

2. Precautions taken, especially the use of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), are lacking and awareness of specific pesticides and hazards is low, putting users at risk. Manual backpack spraying and the use of bare hands in handling pesticides were observed in the study sites.

3. Knowledge and information is not reliably passed on to the user via labels. The survey of retail stores shows that their personnel are not consistently advising agricultural workers, peasants and farmers about the hazards of pesticides.

4. Pesticide advertisements and retail store practices were documented that are in violation of the Code of Conduct set by UN Food and Agriculture Organisation. The agricultural shops of Wonosobo district (Indonesia) offer an annual prize if farmers buy more than Rp60,000 with the prizes of electronic home appliances, motorcycle and even a ticket for a couple to go to Hajj (Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca).

The report and recommendations are based on the initial findings of the Community Monitoring and International Advocacy Project in Asia and will be presented at the Second Session of the International Conference on Chemicals Management in Geneva from 11th – 15th May 2009. It hopes to contribute in monitoring the progress towards SAICM’s overall objective that “by 2020, chemicals are used and produced in ways that lead to the minimization of significant adverse effects on human health and the environment.” Details of the full report can be found at http://www.panap. net/uploads/ media/monitorgre p.pdf.