Employees give NagaWorld 1-week ultimatum in letter

Photo by: Sam Rith
Union members gather last month at a rally in support of laid-off NagaWorld workers.

The Phnom Penh Post
Thursday, 23 July 2009
Sam Rith

Union representing hotel and casino workers calls on City Hall to intervene in negotiation with company over 14 redundancies.

AUNION representing staff at NagaWorld Hotel and Casino has said it will wait one more week before it launches a strike to have 14 laid-off workers reinstated.

Sok Narith, the head of the union that represents 1,000 NagaWorld employees, sent a letter to the Phnom Penh Municipality on Monday warning officials of the workers' intent to strike and requesting that they intervene in negotiations with the company.

"We would like to inform [Phnom Penh Deputy Governor Pa Socheatvong] that hundreds of employees working in this company are looking forward to the results of a negotiation [with NagaWorld] to solve the problem and allow their leaders to go back to work," the letter reads.

Sok Narith, who was among the 14 workers laid off by NagaWorld in February, said it had been nearly one month since Phnom Penh Governor Kep Chuktema pledged to facilitate negotiations with the company.

"But so far we have not received any result," he said. "We demand that the company reinstate the 14 workers."

NagaWorld blamed the economic crisis for the layoffs in February, but employees contend that the company is pushing an anti-union agenda.

Waiting on an explanation
Pa Socheatvong said he was too busy to comment on the issue Wednesday, but municipal official Sam Bun said the city had asked NagaWorld to write a report explaining why the company had laid off the workers. Sam Bun said City Hall had yet to receive any report.

Hay Voleap, deputy manager for human resources at NagaWorld, said Wednesday that his company had already sent the report to the municipality. He declined to comment on whether his company would reinstate the workers.

Sok Narith said his union, the Cambodia Tourism and Service Workers Federation, would begin to take action next week should there be no resolution.

"We can wait another week, [but] if there is still no resolution, we will hold a press conference in front of NagaWorld and then we will strike," he said.

Sok Narith said Pa Socheatvong had requested that the union postpone the press conference to allow municipal officials "to negotiate with the company in order to solve the problem for the union".