Bong Mines, Bong County – Jerry Dennis, a father of five, worked as a fuel supplier for China Union before the company shut down five years into its agreement, laying him off along with over three hundred workers. Now, Jerry rides a motorcycle, collecting small fares for his daily bread.
Report by Mae Azango [email protected]
“The government told us that the company has the right to put us down or lay us off whenever the company have economic crisis.
So, since it was the government who brought China Union here to suffer us, let the government tell China Union to pay us, or we will stage a demonstration, then it will call the government attention” – Solomon Tweh, Redundant China Union Worker
“My man, please pay my money because this is what I do for a living to feed my family,” pleads Jerry Dennis to a passenger on his motorcycle, Jerry is a worker who was made redundant by China Union in 2015.
China Union, which signed a 25-year concession agreement in January 2009 to mine iron ore in Bong Mines, near Kakata, pulled out in 2015 after a fall in the price of iron ore on the world market. Shortly thereafter, China Union laid off 117 workers. In the following months, the total rose to 302 workers.
Like Jerry, many of those workers are demanding benefits and overtime payments from the company, which now has only a small skeleton staff on the ground after its top officials fled during the Ebola crisis.
Employment Letters exhibited by the spokesman for the aggrieved workers showed that some workers were in the employ of the company for two years, while others were employed for shorter periods of six months to a year.
Now, the redundant workers are demanding pay for an hour of overtime for every day they worked for the company, which they say they were entitled to but went unpaid.
“We were supposed to work from 8:AM to 4:PM but we were working up to 5:PM, so China Union owes us one hour overtime, and they do not want to pay us.
The Labor Ministry is aware, while David Sackor, Secretary General of the Liberia Labor Congress, responsible for the workers welfare, is not doing anything about the situation,” Jerry says.
Section 11.1(a) of the concession agreement between China Union and the government of Liberia states the following: “In consistent with applicable Law, the Government, upon request of the Concessionaire or any of its employees, will use reasonable efforts to facilitate the resolution of any dispute that arises between the Concessionaire and any of its employees.”
Solomon Tweh, 36, and a father of four, is another aggrieved worker who was an auto mechanic for China Union. Tweh, who is the spokesman for the workers, added to Jerry’s story, claiming that the company issued them a handbook which said they were to be given two months’ severance pay for every twelve months they worked if they were laid off.
But Tweh says that when they were made redundant, the government rushed to the defense of the company, allowing the workers to only be paid one additional month rather than the two he claims was promised in the handbook.
Addressing Tweh’s allegation that the company paid the laid-off workers only one month’s salary for every twelve months they worked instead of the two months they were due, a Labor Ministry representative said that according to Liberia’s labor law, laid off workers are owed payment of only one month for every twelve, and that thus the company was not in violation of the labor law.
Sackor disputes the workers’ claim, saying there is no way the company’s hand book would contradict labor law, and that a draft of the handbook was reviewed by the Labor Authority.
Some of the laid off workers, who came to Bong Mines from other counties to seek employment with the company, complain they are now stuck in the town, unable to return to their respective counties.
They say they do not have money for transportation and cannot afford to be absent should the company return to pay them the overtime wages they claim they’re owed.
“The government told us that the company has the right to put us down or lay us off whenever the company have economic crisis.”
“So, since it was the government who brought China Union here to suffer us, let the government tell China Union to pay us, or we will stage a demonstration, then it will call the government attention,” says Tweh.
But David Sackor, Secretary General of the Liberia Labor Congress, scoffed at his threat.
“How can redundant workers threaten strike when they are no longer working?
Does it make sense for a man who is not working to strike? If they feel it is the best way to address their problem, let them go ahead and see how far they will go,” he says.
Sackor adds that the mission of the Labor Congress is to advocate for better working conditions, and to make sure that if workers are laid off, they receive just benefits, as each worker pays two percent of his or her salary as monthly dues to the union.
“We have gone through redundancy at China Union more than two or three times. China Union paid the workers off and if the company is to start operations again, those laid off would be the first to be called for employment,” says Sackor.
“We addressed those issues about the overtime a long time ago, so nobody can tell me now that they are demanding overtime from the company. What we are thinking about now is reemployment of the company,” he said.
Despite his role as a worker’s representative, Sackor defends China Union, saying the company was affected by a drop in the price of iron ore on the world market, and that since it was unable to ship iron ore for more than a year, it was not able to keep all of the workers and was forced to lay them off.
China Union has a troubled history in the county. Prior to the Ebola crisis, civil society groups highlighted complaints by locals in Bong Mines, including physical abuse of workers, environmental damage, and unpaid resettlement fees.
In an April 17th press release responding to allegations made in a FrontPageAfrica story on environmental damage in Bong Mines, China Union addressed the claims made by redundant workers that they’re owed overtime.
“Employees that were redundant as a result of drastic fall in the price of iron ore were paid in line with the Labor Laws of Liberia.
The Local Union, the Mother Union and GOL through the Ministry of Labor were fully involved in the implementation process. Some of the redundant workers will be recalled as soon as operations resume.”
Contradicting Sackor, and the company’s recent press release, a representative of the Labor Ministry admitted that China Union owes the redundant workers overtime wages.
“Under the law when you are redundant you are entitled to just earning and not benefits, but when we investigated, we found out that China Union owed many of the workers for overtime.
Because instead of working from 8 a.m.-4 p.m., many workers worked from 8-5, so we told the company to pay the workers overtime.
But the Company said that they were going to celebrate a holiday in China and that when they return in March, we will discuss on how payment for the workers was going to be done,” Says Emmett Crayton, Assistant Labor Minister for Trade Union and Social Dialogue.
Regarding the redundant workers and their unpaid wages, Margibi County District #4 Representative Ben Fofana said: “I once heard of some workers demanding payment, but I forwarded the complaint to the Ministry of Labor and they handled it. Apart from that, I have not gotten any other complaint.”
For Jerry, the unpaid wages remain a source of frustration. “My family knows that I came to Bong Mines to work, but I am forced to ride bike to feed us.
Now I am regretting the day I ever agreed to work for China Union. If I had made farm to survive, it would have been far better than slaving for a billionaire company that cannot even complete my just payment,” he says.
This story was produced in collaboration with New Narratives and the Thomson Reuters Foundation with funding from German Development Cooperation. The founder had no say in the story’s content