PUTRAJAYA, 3 May 2025:
This year’s Labour Day rally by thousands of bank workers in front of the Human Resources Ministry was not a mere demonstration but a gathering to underscore serious concern over the erosion of trade union rights in the country, the National Union of Bank Employees (NUBE) says.
The ‘Voice of the Voiceless’ rally was held to demand justice, accountability and the restoration of workers’ rights, currently under threat from what NUBE called “anti-union discrimination” by Human Resources Minister Steven Sim.
“The May Day rally was a peaceful, lawful expression of workers’ demands and a collective stand against injustice,” NUBE general secretary J. Solomon said. “NUBE calls on all workers and the public to stand in solidarity for the dignity, justice and freedom of trade unions in Malaysia.”
At the heart of NUBE’s grievances is minister Sim’s alleged collusion with the 17 member banks of the Malayan Commercial Banks Association (MCBA), which Solomon says has actively undermined trade unionism, violating both national legal frameworks and internationally-recognised labour standards.
A key point of the contention involves what the NUBE chief calls “secret negotiations” between the minister and the banks. These negotiations, according to Solomon, enabled MCBA to avoid paying the annual one-month Festival Aid that approximately 15,000 banking workers across the country were to receive in 2024 and onwards.
The union also alleges that Sim had infringed upon NUBE’s legitimate bargaining rights by referring to the Industrial Court the 20th Collective Agreement that it was to embark with the MCBA, before any talks could even commence between the two sides.
“We wish to remind the minister that Malaysia had ratified the ILO Convention 98 way back in 1961, or nearly seven decades ago, and that mandates the government to take all measures necessary to encourage and promote voluntary negotiations between workers and their employers,” Solomon said.
More distressing to NUBE were complaints of workplace harassment at banks, including sexual harassment, that the Human Resource Ministry had not taken seriously enough to investigate, Solomon said.
“These are not mere bureaucratic oversights — they represent systemic attacks on workers’ dignity,” the NUBE chief said.
Solomon urged Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s Madani Government to uphold the ILO Convention 98 and enforce the Industrial Relations Act 1967 in adherence to objectives of the 12th Malaysia Plan to strengthen trade unions.
Alongside this, he said NUBE will be seeking a Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate the actions of Sim and relevant persons at the Human Resources Ministry, as well as the CEOs of the 17 banks within the MCBA, on the violations of domestic laws and international labour standards cited by the union.
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