SCHOOL cleaners from 19 schools in Sabak Bernam were finally paid today after four months of not receiving their salaries, but have found their back pay deducted.

Two of them said most of them who protested over their delayed salary outside the Prime Minister’s Office in Putrajaya earlier this week had found their wages deducted.

One of the cleaners, Osman Uton, 46, said his pay was deducted by about 40%, but did not know why.

“Maybe the school was not so happy with the cleanliness and maybe the deduction was done due to us participating in the protest,” he told The Malaysian Insight.

However, he said he is still glad for the payment as he has been struggling since November.

“The past four months has not been easy supporting the family without any income so I’m glad that I have finally gotten paid,” he said.

On Tuesday, 53 school cleaners from 19 schools in Sabak Bernam protested outside the Prime Minister’s Office.

They held placards explaining their woes, which, besides salary arrears, included problems with their annual leave, demands for salary increments, and contributions to the Employees Provident Fund (EPF).

Another cleaner, Kamilah Rashad, 55, who has been a school cleaner for over 20 years, said her back pay was deducted by 20%.

A cleaner who only wanted to be known as Mastura said if it was not for the protest, she does not think they would have been paid.

“I am very sure that if we didn’t do what we did at Putrajaya on Tuesday, we would have not gotten paid today.

“At least now we can use a bit of the money we got to prepare for Hari Raya Aidilfitri next month,” she said.

The cleaners told The Malaysian Insight they will “take what they can get” as they do not think anything can be done about the deducted pay.

Kamilah added that this salary delay is the longest one she has experienced.

“There have been salary delays previously but it has never been up to four months.

“The previous companies were terminated once they delayed the salary so we hope the same will happen this time,” she said, referring to the private companies subcontracted by the Education Ministry to handle the cleaning of public schools.

Kamilah said subcontractors that are not terminated swiftly would most likely continue exploiting workers.

The cleaners said they are engaged by several different companies.

Mastura added that the cleaners are waiting to see if any action will be taken against the companies involved.

“We hope to get some good news as we do not want this incident to happen again,” she said.

Parti Sosialis Malaysia (PSM), which has been helping the cleaners and highlighting their plight, has called for the contract system for school cleaners to be abolished.

It says they should instead be directly employed by the government or the schools, PSM deputy president S. Arutchelvan said, so their welfare can be protected.

“The cleaners should be supervised by the government administration department instead of private companies,” Arutchelvan told The Malaysian Insight.

Hospital cleaners have also faced a similar plight and held a protest convoy in February from Penang to the Health Ministry in Putrajaya to hand a memorandum to Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin, detailing their wages problems and the “modern-day slavery” conditions they said they were subjected to by the private contractors who hired them.

The protest convoy by some 30 members from the National Union of Workers in Hospital Support and Allied Services demanded that the contract system be abolished, hospital cleaners absorbed as full-time civil servants, payment of Covid-19 allowances be given to healthcare frontliners, and an end be put to private companies’ harassment of union members. – April 1, 2022.