The following is the full Company statement on the recent Yoma Central Workers Protest.
‘On Tuesday 19 January 2021, construction workers working at the Yoma Central site in downtown Yangon took to the streets to protest salary and compensation-related grievances. We would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused to the community as a result of the disruption.
Yoma Central is a project invested and developed by Yoma Group and its partners, and they have engaged BYMA-Taisei Joint Venture as the Main Contractor for the construction of the project. The labour dispute between BYMA Myanmar Limited (“BYMA”) and BYMA’s construction workers arose due to a one-time adjustment on BYMA’s pay cycle. The new pay cycle calculates wages based on actual working days whereas the old pay cycle had calculated and paid wages in advance. This adjustment was not adequately communicated to the workers. In response to the workers’ concerns, BYMA had reacted immediately by paying out in full the wage discrepancy on the morning of the protest.
Separate issues regarding social security benefits (“SSB”) payments were clarified in a meeting between BYMA, their workers, SSB officials and government officials, and the procedural delays of the SSB refunds have also been resolved with a payment timeline in the coming days agreed between respective parties.
We regret that the issues raised by the workers were not addressed in a timely manner through the labour grievance mechanisms in place in BYMA. These serious lapses are being investigated and we will work to ensure better communication, understanding and alignment with local practices between ourselves, our contractors and their workers.
Media reports that BYMA had cut the salaries of the workers are incorrect. We would also like to clarify that shareholders of the Yoma Central project have fully paid up all capital commitments to date. The developers have also kept current payments due to the project’s contractors.
We take the welfare and well-being of our workers and staffs seriously, and expect our contractors to do the same. During these difficult times, particularly since the disruptions caused by COVID-19 since March 2020, the project has put in place a number of safety measures while continuing to employ as many as 4,000 workers on site. Additional steps were taken to provide welfare subsidy during the government mandated stop-work period in October 2020 to support the workers’ livelihood. We will take active steps to engage our contractors to continuously place importance in the welfare and well-being of all workers.’
