Workers want RCA to pay

Over 100 former RCA Taiwan employees yesterday petitioned the Executive Yuan to compensate those that they say suffered as a result of pollution originating from the company's factory in Taoyuan County.

In addition, the RCA Self-Help Association (RCA員工自救會) requested that corrective measures be made to government agencies which failed to force the company to reduce pollution at the factory.

Agitated by the dismissal five months ago of a special Cabinet task force which coordinated inter-agency efforts to handle the pollution and its aftermath, former RCA workers and their supporters who gathered outside the Executive Yuan said they doubted the government's commitment to solving their problem.

They said that the dismissal of the task force had made the RCA victims' communication with the agencies concerned more difficult and slowed efforts to help workers.

Chen Chin-huang (陳錦煌), a minister without portfolio and former convener of the special task force, argued that the Cabinet could still coordinate inter-agency efforts. He denied that the task force had been formally dismissed.

"We just don't hold regular meetings as before because tasks related to the matter have become fewer."

But the Taiwan Association for Victims of Occupational Accidents and Diseases (TAVOAD, 工作傷害受害人協會) said the Cabinet had failed to respond to its request for an inter-agency meeting three months ago.

Both associations said that water and soil pollution at the plant was responsible for 1,375 cases of cancer and 216 deaths among employees.

The workers and human rights groups are pressuring the government to loosen its stringent standards for determining occupational diseases.

"Then the government should immediately carry out subrogation of compensation for the victims," said a TAVOAD statement. Subrogation of compensation involves the government paying compensation before seeking indemnification from the wrongdoer, in this case the alleged polluter, RCA.

According to the Control Yuan (監察院), the plant had been found to be breaching regulations protecting laborers from being poisoned by chemical solvents. The findings were made during each of eight inspections carried out while the plant was still operational.

After the plant's closure in 1991 after 16 years of operation, it was also disclosed that a well had been dug at the factory for the underground dumping of toxic byproducts.

The soil and underground water used by RCA employers was confirmed as heavily contaminated by trichloroethylene and tetrachloroethylene.

The Control Yuan yesterday promised to investigate the responsibility of government agencies in supervising waste processing and labor protection, in response to the petitioners' protest.

A report commissioned by the government has indicated that the solvents greatly heightened the risks of cancer in the neighborhood of the plant. But the workers still await critical confirmation relating to the health hazards of their former working environment. This will enable them to demonstrate that these were the direct causes of their suffering and let them qualify for certain forms of government aid, as well as to assist them in suing RCA.

"That's why solutions remain elusive after so many years," said the minister.

"But more and more of us are dying from cancer ... We can no longer wait," said the workers.