PM to meet ministers over garment workers’ unrest

Prime Minister Tarique Rahman will meet several ministers at the Secretariat this evening to discuss measures to address the ongoing unrest among garment workers.

The meeting is expected to focus on the current situation, the causes of the unrest and the steps needed to resolve the problems, according to multiple government sources on Sunday.

Earlier in the day, Labour and Employment Minister Ariful Haque Chowdhury announced the formation of a wage board to determine a new minimum wage for garment workers.

Speaking at the Ministry of Labour and Employment around 11:30 AM, the minister said the government had formed a six-member minimum wage board in accordance with the labour law. The board is chaired by Senior District Judge Sheikh Ashfakur Rahman and became effective on Sunday.

He said the board would hold a meeting as soon as possible and announce a decision on the minimum wage after discussions. He expressed hope that workers would end their street protests, return to their respective workplaces and resume work.

The minister said the government had held several meetings with workers and factory owners over the past three days. As Friday and Saturday were holidays, he said, the government had clearly informed them that the wage board would be announced on Sunday.

Despite the announcement, he alleged, a group was deliberately using workers to destabilise the government and create public suffering.

He further alleged that several political organisations were trying to create instability. Referring to a banned student organisation, he claimed that one of its organisational secretaries had joined the protests posing as a worker and that photographs of the individual had appeared on social media.

He alleged that another group was trying to exploit the workers’ movement for its own interests, adding that such efforts would fail if the public remained alert.

For the past several days, garment workers have blocked roads and staged demonstrations in areas around Mirpur-10, Mirpur-11 and Mirpur-12 in Dhaka, demanding a minimum monthly wage of Tk 30,000.

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