A growing regional campaign is calling on Malaysia to take a leadership role in the upcoming International Labour Conference in Geneva this June. They’re urging Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim to support unprecedented measures under Article 33 of the International Labour Organization’s Constitution—the most serious sanction the ILO can impose—in response to Myanmar’s military junta’s continued violation of workers’ rights and violent suppression of democracy. On this episode of #ConsiderThis Melisa Idris speaks with Apolinar ‘Dong’ Tolentino, the Asia Pacific Regional Representative from Building and Wood Workers’ International. BWI is a Global Union Federation representing 365 trade unions, with members in the building, construction, wood, forestry, and allied industries.
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00:00Hello and good evening. I'm Melissa Idris. Welcome to Consider This. This is the show
00:24where we want you to consider and then reconsider what you know of the news of the day. A growing
00:29regional campaign is calling on Malaysia to take a leadership role in the upcoming International
00:35Labour Conference in Geneva this June. They're urging Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim to support
00:40unprecedented measures under Article 33 of the International Labour Organization's constitution.
00:48It is the most serious sanction the ILO can impose and this is in response to Myanmar's
00:54military junta's continued violation of workers' rights and the violent suppression of democracy.
01:01So what role can Malaysia play to defend workers and democracy in Myanmar? Joining us now is
01:08Apollina Tolentino who is more familiarly known as Dong. He is the Asia-Pacific Regional Representative
01:16from the Building and Woodworkers International which is a global union federation representing
01:23365 trade unions with members in the building, construction, wood, forestry and allied industries.
01:30Dong, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for joining me. Maybe you can begin our conversation
01:34today by sharing a little bit about the current situation, the current reality for workers and
01:42trade unions in Myanmar under the military regime. Thank you for having me here. It's a privilege
01:49for us. Since day one that the military junta took over, the first very act that they have done
01:56is to declare as illegal organizations more than 16 legitimate trade union organizations that had been
02:06formed and registered in the early 2010-2011 when the country opened up and amended its antiquated trade union law
02:18for the last 50 years. They also declared persona non grata, the 21 member of the executive committee
02:29of the Confederation of Trade Union. This is the most representative trade union APEC organization
02:35in Myanmar. They revoked their passports and also their national identity cards simply to bar them or to
02:45prohibit them to attending that 2021 international labor conference in ILO to report what the junta has done.
02:54Aside from that, there is no in any way that workers and trade union rights can be freely expressed
03:03under the military junta. We have received very reliable reports that the workers, the unions are allowed anymore.
03:11And if you complain, for example, for delayed payment or for overtime, what the boss will do is either call the police
03:19or the military authorities to arrest you on the spot or detain you. This May Day celebration, we received reports
03:28reports that those who prayed to commemorate Labor Day had been interrogated by authorities saying this assembly is illegal.
03:39This is what is happening now in Myanmar in terms of workers and trade union rights.
03:44Right. So you are now calling for the situation to have international attention, international action.
03:51Talk to me a little bit about the Article 33 of the ILO Constitution.
03:58What exactly are you asking or by asking for it to be invoked?
04:04What exactly are you calling for?
04:07In practical terms, what does that mean for Myanmar?
04:09Yeah. Let me backtrack a little bit. The ILO is the only organization within the UN family
04:20that is a tripartite in nature, meaning government representatives, employer representatives and workers
04:27representatives are sitting together in what we call the tripartite constituents of the ILO.
04:33And in the ILO Constitution, the highest supervisory body, you know, the one that investigates on noncompliance of member states
04:42or violation of workers and trade union rights is called the Commission of Inquiry.
04:48The Commission of Inquiry was established in 2022 and it has went into the allegations,
04:58testimonies, and they asked the military junta to allow them inside so they will be given a chance
05:05to repudiate or even challenge those allegations like what I have told you.
05:11But they refused.
05:13In 2023 of September, the Commission of Inquiry report and recommendation was publicly released
05:20and it has 11 recommendations.
05:22Among others is to release underconditionally political prisoners, state union included.
05:29But since the release of this report for the last three years or so, even the governing body that is meeting every quarter of the year
05:38had established that the military junta had done nothing, any serious attempts to implement these 11 recommendations.
05:46And now, the forthcoming international labor conference, meaning all members of the ILO will gather
05:53and deliberate on this resolution on Myanmar invoking Article 33.
05:59Article 33 will enjoin member states, all constituents, government, employer organizations, and workers' organizations
06:09to review its working relationship, political, economic ties with the military junta.
06:16And there are two specific measures that are mentioned in the resolution.
06:20One is to cut or bar free plowing of the financial support to the junta, which they are using to buy ammunition,
06:29supplies to the military.
06:31And most important is the aviation fuel.
06:35Many countries in the North America, UK, and so on, has already put sanctions on this aviation fuel
06:44because the military is losing its ground, political territories every day, captured, outrun by the armed ethnic organizations.
06:53And their only advantage now is their area superiority because they have the jets, they have the helicopters and drones and everything.
07:01And these are made to attacks even after the earthquake, for example, because they have a supply, steady supply of aviation fuel.
07:11This must stop.
07:12And this is in the measures included in Article 33.
07:16Okay, so explain to me Malaysia's position then, because you've issued an open letter to the Prime Minister calling for him to help, for Malaysia to take a stand.
07:27Why do you believe Malaysia's position is so important to this resolution?
07:33Malaysia, under the leadership of the Prime Minister, has a very distinct and crucial role to make as a chair of the ASEAN members,
07:45the 10 member states of the ASEAN members, and he's very influential.
07:51There's a high regard on his leadership in this ASEAN body.
07:57And even prior to taking on the chairmanship of the ASEAN this year, he has made many public promulgation announcements that there must be a new formula,
08:08a new approach aside from the five-point consensus that has been agreed upon.
08:12We believe that the Prime Minister can extend its appeal, if you like, to the rest of the member states of ASEAN.
08:24We are very worried with countries that are in the same playbook, if you like, with the military junta.
08:32Of course, you have Cambodia, Thailand, it's almost the same.
08:37We don't have any hope, to be honest, with Vietnam and Laos.
08:41And this can be swing to the support with Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines and Singapore.
08:48But it's a tall order, we know, because ASEAN will always do a consensus decision-making.
08:54But under the leadership of the Malaysian Prime Minister, we are confident that it will be a support on the adoption of the resolution on Myanmar.
09:03Don, can I ask you about these sanctions under Article 33?
09:08If I understand correctly, this is the toughest sanctions under the ILO, and it's only been invoked once before in ILO history, in the case of Myanmar, if I'm not mistaken.
09:18Can you talk to me about why you think it might work?
09:21Did it work then and might it work now?
09:23Oh, that's a good question.
09:27Actually, Burma then was already subjected to a sanction in the early 2000s under Convention on False Labour.
09:37There have been established facts, investigations, that they are violating and employing child labour in the military and even in the usual business.
09:50And the ILO at that time has imposed a sanction on or invoked Article 33.
09:58And it really hit the business of the junta.
10:02We have to be mindful that many enterprises in Myanmar are still state-owned enterprises, oil and gas, forest and so on.
10:11And if ever this resolution on Myanmar is adopted in June next month, it will be a history that a particular country, in this case Myanmar, had been subjected to Article 33.
10:25The other country in the most recent years, in 2023, was Belarus, because you know what happened in Belarus.
10:33But Myanmar will be in history in the ILO to be subjected on the resolution invoking Article 33.
10:42Okay.
10:43Well, talk to me about the role of labour unions also.
10:46What can labour unions across Asia, and I know it's quite a fragmented landscape, but what can labour unions businesses do more to isolate the junta economically?
10:59I'm just wondering, you know, what regional solidarity might look like in this case?
11:06The workers group, as they are called in the ILO, are 100% behind this resolution.
11:14We are reaching out to our counterparts, the employers' organisation.
11:19There are many reasonable, scrupulous business people that they would like to do business without any harm under the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.
11:34And this must be supported by both the workers' organisation and the employers' organisation.
11:42In the end, actually, it's good for the brands of the business, because you do business in the right way, that you don't harm any, and you don't perpetuate the violation of workers' and trade union rights, as in the case of Military Junta.
11:58Yeah. Thank you so much, Dong, for sharing some of your insights and your experiences.
12:03That was Apollina Tolentino from the Building and Woodworkers International.
12:07We're going to take a quick break here on Consider This.
12:10We will be back with more, so stay tuned.