By Park Chung-a
Staff Reporter
Around 600 unionized workers at the E-Land Group, a giant fashion and retail outlet, continued their strike into a second week Monday, urging the company to cancel its decision to lay off more than 900 non-regular workers.
Over the weekend, thousands of unionized workers occupied 13 chain stores, mostly in Seoul and nearby cities in Gyeonggi Province, demanding improved job security and the reinstatement of their fired coworkers.
The protest grew smaller Monday as the protestors narrowed their rally, occupying two shopping outlets in western and southern Seoul. Operations were not affected in the remaining 11 stores across the country.
While roughly 300 unionized workers coming from as far as Suncheon, Busan and Ulsan continued their strike in the outlet in the World Cup Stadium in Samgam-dong, another 300 marched to a store in southern Seoul.
Meanwhile, the remaining protestors vowed to continue their strike and declared the launch of a campaign to boycott E-Land products, crushing hopes of closing the rift between labor and management of the fashion and retail giant.
The company management said the protest has cost upwards of 6.5 billion won in financial damages.
Labor Minister Lee Sang-soo warned that the government will not tolerate what it called an illegal act by the labor union, implying the dispatch of police.
``The labor union's occupation is clearly an illegal act,'' said Lee in a news briefing later in the day. ``The government cannot tolerate this situation and we will deal with the strike according to law and principle.''
The E-Land strike was brought upon by the government's new labor bill that went into effect on July 1. The bill was aimed at protecting roughly 5.5 million part-time and other temporary workers, 35 percent of the total workforce here.
Under the legislation, contract-based workers are automatically granted regular status if they work for more than two years at the same company.
However, the E-Land Group employers have fired hundreds of part-time cashiers at its New Core department stores and Homeever outlets _ previously Carrefour's local branches _ and replaced them with outsourced workers, in direct opposition to the government's intention.
Its labor union has called the move an abuse of the law, which degraded the rights of non-regular workers.
The collective strike at E-Land has now become political with the progressive Democratic Labor Party and the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, the country's largest umbrella labor group, offering strong support to the E-Land union.
The case also shows the loopholes in the new labor bill, which has consistently brought criticism from both workers and management.
The law is expected to result in more layoffs of non-regular workers as management will prefer outsourcing to direct hiring to reduce labor costs, employers and workers have said.