Two labor groups engage in war of nerves over membership tallies
The nation's two umbrella labor groups are protesting government tallies of their membership, which suggest that they have fewer members than in-house assessments have shown.
Source : Korea Times
The nation's two umbrella labor groups are protesting government tallies of their membership, which suggest that they have fewer members than in-house assessments have shown.
The Labor Ministry said yesterday that officials from the Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU) and the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) filed separate complaints contending that government tallies - made known to the two groups before the release of official government figures next week - show they have recently suffered dramatic reductions in membership. The two groups demanded reassessments.
The FKTU claims a total membership of 1.03 million workers while Labor Ministry figures suggest it has 890,000.
Similarly, KCTU figures show it has 582,000 members, 30,000 more than the government tally.
The size of a labor group's membership not only serves as an indication of its power, but is also used to decide how many seats it receives on key panels such as the Central Labor Relations Committee and Minimum Wage Council.
The Labor Ministry made clear that it had no intention of confirming its figures, which were drawn up based on reports submitted to government offices by the unions themselves.
"One can't be sure that the labor groups' figures are correct, either," a ministry official said.
According to government figures, the FKTU had a total of 901,000 members as of the end of 1998, while the KCTU had 418,000.
This indicates that the FKTU lost about 100,000 members while the KCTU has expanded by 130,000 during the following year.
(Korea Herald )
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