KOTA KINABALU – Sabah has paid the salaries and the Employee Provident Fund contributions of all former Sabah Forest Industries (SFI) workers involved.
Assistant Minister to the Chief Minister Datuk Abidin Madingkir said the state has also paid some RM798,000 in electricity bills incurred by the former SFI workers.
“The state has taken action out of compassion to help the plight of former SFI workers since 2019 and during the Covid-19 pandemic,” he said in a statement today.
However, Abidin said while the state empathised with their plight, it is not sustainable for the government to solve their predicament in the long run.
Pending the reactivation of the mill by a new concessionaire, the former workers have been advised by the state to look at the matter realistically, move on, and seek alternative employment.
Abidin said the state had imposed a conditional requirement for the new concessionaire to set up operations within two years. The former workers may apply to work in the new company.
He did not disclose the amount of salaries paid to the former SFI workers. The Sipitang district officer has been directed to engage with and update the former SFI workers, he said.
The workers had been laid off by their former employer, India-based pulp and paper manufacturer Ballarpur Industries Ltd, which has been in receivership since 2017.
In November 2021, Sabah Timber Industry Employees’ Union secretary-general Engril Liaw said that 1,032 former SFI workers had been left in the lurch over RM23.4 million in unpaid wages as the high court here ordered the winding up of the company.
She said the amount in backdated pay could come to RM2.6 million a month.
Last month, The Vibes reported that the electricity and water supply to the SFI estate in Sipitang had been cut off, affecting almost 2,000 former workers in the housing quarters.
The state has allowed the former SFI workers to continue living in the workers’ quarters after the Sabah Land and Survey Department issued a reclamation notice for the 46.033-ha estate.
On November 16 last year, the high court rejected the SFI suit against the chief minister and the state government over the cancellation of its timber licence agreements following the closure of the pulp and paper mill. – The Vibes, January 16, 2023
