Released from jail after being granted clemency by the president just a month ago, the country's best known labor activist yesterday set up an organization to help jobless laborers, continuing his struggle to assist Taiwan's workers.
Tseng Mao-hsing (
The long-time labor rights activist said the organization will calculate the number of vacancies available in Taiwan's industries and provide the information to the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA).
The establishment of the database, which will be collated by grassroots workers around the country, will facilitate labor authorities' efforts to find jobs for unemployed laborers, Tseng said.
To protest against a textile factory's abrupt closure and refusal to issue severance pay or pensions, Tseng and workers of the factory mounted a demonstration and laid down on a railway line in Taoyuan County in 1996. For this act, he was sentenced to 10 months in prison, convicted for endangering public order.
Labor groups and CLA Chairwoman Chen Chu (
After being released, Tseng and his son, Tseng Wen-sheng (曾文生), also a labor activist, worked to organize a coalition of jobless workers from seven local companies, many of whom lost their jobs as a result of the factory closures.
At the formation of the coalition outside the CLA yesterday, the jobless workers complained that their former employers closed the factories without any notice, and that they did not receive any severance pay or retirement pension following the closures.
"I've lost jobs three times under the same circumstances," said a laborer at yesterday's launch. "All I want is a stable job with which to support my family, but I don't know why it is so difficult to find one."
Tseng said the mission of the new organization is to provide information on job vacancies around the country to the CLA, which has encouraged the provision of such information by grassroots organizations.
"It's only a humble end we're pursuing -- to find the workers stable jobs," Tseng said.
In response, the CLA welcomed the formation of the coalition and said it expects to work closely with the non-official organization to resolve the mounting unemployment problem.
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