Casino workers returned to protest outside NagaWorld 1 on Sunday but have been blocked by local authorities who have barricaded all streets leading to the casino.
The Phnom Penh Municipal Court deemed a strike by hundreds of suspended and active NagaWorld workers illegal, while authorities deemed the strike a violation of Covid-19 protocols and ordered workers to end the strike.
Tuesday’s meeting, held by video conference, was the first of four weekly sessions planned for the tripartite negotiations, according to a document signed by the Labor Minister Ith Samheng.
In a move a labor group said was unprecedented, NagaWorld is calling on governmental labor inspectors to authorize the dismissal of a group of union leaders as part of the casino’s mass layoffs, overriding the legal protections unionists enjoy unless they have committed serious offenses, a workers’ representative said.
Following years of complaints about poor service, Cintri was put under state management in 2019, and as of July its work split up among three companies. Promises to keep all employees on the payroll were broken when 1,176 workers were terminated as of July 1.
Phnom Penh casino NagaWorld plans to lay off more than 1,300 workers this month amid its temporary closure due to Covid-19 — a plan its union will contest as a violation of the Labor Law.
As garment factory workers age, their contracts are less likely to be renewed, they struggle to be hired, and they’re cast out with little training to take on anything new, workers and advocates say.
After a day of trying to speak to her factory’s HR manager over union members losing their jobs, Soy Sros posted her frustrations online. Two days later, police showed up at the factory and imprisoned her for almost two months. Her charge is pending.
Former staff of the closed Great Duke hotel in Phnom Penh have been awarded compensation by arbiters, as unions again demanded changes to the Trade Union Law, which they say restricts workers’ rights and the ability to organize.
About 800 workers from a factory in Kampong Speu province have protested for two days in a row demanding the reinstatement of their representatives.
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