Fifty-six former workers of a Chinese daily are upset with the National Union of Newspaper Workers (NUNW) for taking away without their consent, 25 percent of the compensation owing to them for wrongful dismissal more than a decade ago.

A score of them were at the press conference held at the DAP headquarters in Petaling Jaya to urge the union to be transparent and accountable to members.

The group, who called themselves the NUNW former members welfare committee, had worked at Sin Chew Jit Poh now known as Sin Chew Daily before they were sacked by the new management which took over in 1988 after the one-year suspension of the daily during Operasi Lalang.

The union then brought up their case to the Industrial Court the same year.

Fourteen years on, the workers won their case and the publishing company was ordered to compensate them in accordance with their collective agreement.

However, the group only managed to get around 75 percent out of what they should have gotten.

No written statement

"After we received the cheque recently, we found that we only managed to get a total of RM834,855 out of the RM1.15 million compensation," the committee chairperson Leow Cheong Chew said.

"According to the lawyer who handled our case, the remaining 25 percent has been dispersed to the union and him as service charge and commission. The lawyer said it was a directive from the union," he explained, though refusing to divulge the lawyer's name.

Leow and his group questioned the union for taking out 25 percent of the compensation without consulting them. They also alleged that the union had tried to hide the total amount and was lacking in transparency on this matter.

"We did not receive any written statement informing us of the compensation we were to receive." Leow said.

On top of that, he said, some of the workers had been members of the union for well over 20 years, and had paid their subscription fees annually.

"The union should be the organisation that protects our rights and welfare. It is unreasonable of them to grab such an high amount of service charge from the compensation," he added.

The group, who failed repeatedly to meet with NUNW before the press conference yesterday, gave the union three days to reply to their queries, failing which legal action will be taken.

Lawyer's fees

Met later, the committee's treasurer Thoo Ka Chong told malaysiakini that he was unhappy and unsatisfied with the way the union handled the case.

"We are the members of the union; we never thought we needed to pay for the lawyer's fees," he said, insisting that union's obligation is to the members and their welfare.

"I hope the union will take note of our action and give a satisfactory answer to us," said the former graphics department officer of the daily, now a businessman.

The others in the group were previously imposers, clerks, packers, operators, photo typesetters and librarians with the daily.

When contacted today, NUNW officials refused to comment.