Published March 18, 2009

Keppel's Cebu shipyard faces worker strike

Firm's redundancy programme to see loss of 200 jobs

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WORKERS at Keppel Corp's Keppel Cebu Shipyard in the Philippines filed a strike notice on Monday after the announcement of a redundancy programme that would see the loss of some 200 jobs.

According to the Keppel Shipyard-National Federation of Labor, the redundancy programme would mean the loss of 70 per cent of 280 regular jobs, the Philippine Daily Inquirer reported.

'We would like to confirm that Keppel Cebu is exiting ship repair to concentrate on shipbuilding. This is part of Keppel O&M's rationalisation exercise to reduce its excess capacity for local ship repair requirements in the Philippines. Instead of closing down any facility, we have decided to use the excess capacity for specialised shipbuilding,' a Keppel spokesman said.

'The rationalisation exercise will affect around half of Keppel Cebu's 400-strong workforce. Plans are underway to facilitate the outplacement of affected personnel who would like to seek employment in other Keppel shipyards in the Philippines and elsewhere,' she added.

The union however accused management of union busting. 'Workers will again not leave the shipyard premises and sacrifice time with our families in order to protest the illegal termination. Keppel management is using the crisis as an excuse to replace regular jobs with cheap and docile contractual labour,' union president Roger Igot said.

Trouble had started brewing since last week when some union members had stayed overnight inside the Keppel yard as an initial protest action. A picket at the shipyard's gates was subsequently held.

Keppel said that its operations at the Cebu yard are not affected and that there are no other similar programmes planned at its other yards. The spokesman reiterated that the action in Cebu was made necessary due to its rationalisation programme.