By Jon Land
The low wages that workers receive in East Timor today are little different from the pre-referendum rate, but given the dramatic increase in food and basic commodity prices since then, East Timorese can afford to purchase only a fraction of what they could previously. A price survey conducted between August and October in the Dili market found that there had been a rise in the consumer price index of approximately 200%.
Protests have already occurred in response to this situation. East Timorese health workers at a clinic in Los Palos demanded in December that they receive money wages rather than payment in food and aid. On January 5, the Alliance of Socialist Workers (ASW), which is affiliated to the Socialist Party of Timor (PST), helped to organise a protest outside the offices of the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET) to make five demands: a increased wages, lower prices, greater consultation with the East Timorese, an end to imported labour, and more jobs for East Timorese.
This is the first such coordinated protest to take place in East Timor since UNTAET was established. According to PST secretary-general Avelino da Silva, some 800 to 1000 East Timorese were involved in the action, which lasted for four hours.
Before the rally, the ASW formed an organising committee which involved workers who are not ASW members but agreed with the demands put forward by the ASW. Workers met at the PST office in Balide early on the morning of January 5, from where they marched to the UNTAET office carrying banner and flags.
The protesters gathered outside the UNTAET headquarters, where they read out their demands and placed placards and banners on the fence. East Timorese working in the UNTAET office were told by their employers to ignore the rally and continue working. A delegation from the protesters met with UNTAET staff who said that the administration would investigate the unfair wages grievance.