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La Mode workers hold rally for back wages
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Posted on Apr 04 2005
Some 70 former La Mode workers held a rally at the Governor’s Office yesterday to push for the immediate payment of their back wages.
The workers said they began to congregate outside the building at 8:30am and stayed there until late afternoon.
“We want the government to help us push La Mode to pay us immediately,” said one of the workers, who requested anonymity.
La Mode and two other factories downsized and closed their operations early this year following the global lifting of trade quotas, leaving some 1,000 unemployed workers.
The workers said attorney general Pamela Brown met with them and told them that they can either stay on island to await the resolution of their case or go back to China and just wait for the money that would be sent to them.
“She [Brown] said we have to two choices: to stay or return to China. We want to stay here and wait for our money here,” said the worker.
He said La Mode owes them three payrolls. He said they are set to have a hearing about their case at the Department of Labor on April 28 and 29.
Press secretary Peter A. Callaghan said the workers’ plea is understandable but “it just doesn’t make sense if they stay here, if they have no work, no money.”
The government, he said, can bring the workers home. “They can go home. The money will be sent to them when it’s settled here,” he said.
Callaghan said that Brown, through a U.S. Labor interpreter, has explained the whole situation to the workers yesterday.
La Mode, according to the workers, is now under an American owner. They said that the factory continues to operate but “not full-scale.”
“There’s a small work left,” said a worker.
Under the law, it is the employer’s responsibility to repatriate its workers. If the company cannot afford the cost, the burden is supposed to fall on the company’s bonding firm. The abrupt closure, however, of the three garment firms has created a problem since repatriating hundreds of workers all at once would bankrupt most bonding companies in the CNMI.
