‘A heightened atmosphere of fear’: Bangladeshi garment workers' fight for fair pay isn't over

Experts say the aftershocks of the protests will be felt across the garment industry for years to come.

Photo: Arshadul Haque Rocky for Bangladesh Garment Workers Solidarity

After months of protests, the heavily politicised minimum wage negotiations in Bangladesh have come to a close, but experts say the aftershocks will be felt across the garment industry for years to come.

The Bangladeshi government has set the new monthly minimum wage at 12,500 taka (about $113) — just over half of the 23,000 taka (about $208) proposed by workers and unions when talks started in April. The trade unions that came together for the negotiations have called off the protests in order to redirect their efforts in the short term to incremental changes within individual factories, but they maintain that the minimum wage is still far below what’s needed to support a family in Bangladesh and a longer-term solution must be found.

The impact of the violent crackdown from the Bangladeshi police and military is still being felt. Throughout the protests, which also began in April and escalated after the increase to 12,500 taka was proposed in November, there have been reports of violence against protestors. This only became worse when, with wage protests taking place simultaneously alongside pre-election rallies, political opposition attempted to co-opt the cause for their own gains. In the election on 7 January — which critics, including the US State Department, say was not free or fair and the UK said was rife with “acts of intimidation and violence” — prime minister Sheikh Hasina was re-elected for a fourth consecutive term.

Under her rule, the country has been seen as increasingly autocratic, with with mass arrests, forced disappearances and extrajudicial killings of political opponents and activists.” It’s in this environment that the wage protests grew more violent and more dangerous for workers, and that is not likely to let up now. With garment workers saying the minimum wage is still far from adequate, many expect protests to continue and violence to follow, generating a heightened atmosphere of fear around the wage debate.

Already at least four garment workers have been killed, hundreds more hospitalised or injured, and advocacy group Worker Rights Consortium (WRC) estimates that between 115 to 200 remain in prison (many in dire conditions with no option of bail). Several news outlets have reported 3-4,000 workers being fired for having participated in the protests; WRC says it has yet to verify these claims.