Indonesia’s labour movement is deeply divided over political patronage

In Jakarta last month, many May Day demonstrations took place, but two stood out as reflections of the divisions among Indonesia’s trade unions.

At the National Monument (Monas), tens of thousands of workers gathered at a rally with President Prabowo Subianto as the guest of honour. Several kilometres away at the People’s Representative Council complex, around 10,000 people assembled under a different banner: “May Day with the People”. Their stated position was an explicit refusal to be co-opted by the government.

This oppositional split represents the latest iteration of a decades-long structural tension within Indonesian organised labour: between unions that operate inside the existing political cartel and those that attempt to build independent power outside elite patronage. The polarisation between the elite union bureaucracy and the more militant, independent-minded activists has been a fundamental division since organised labour re-entered the political terrain soon after 1998.

The competing rallies also exposed two contradictory conceptions of what trade unions are for. The first stream mostly traces its origins back to the official unions of the Suharto era. The second traces its origins to the pro-democracy movement of the 1990s. The first is represented by major confederations: the Confederation of All-Indonesian Workers’ Union (KSPSI), the Indonesian Trade Union Confederation (KSPI) and the Confederation of United Indonesian Workers (KPBI). KSPI president Said Iqbal is its main figure and was among those standing with Prabowo at the Monas fiesta. Some smaller federations also took part.

The second conception is represented by the Alliance of Labour Movement with the People (GEBRAK), which includes the 100,000-strong Indonesian Trade Union Congress Alliance (KASBI), the Indonesian Workers’ Struggle Federation (FPBI) and several other smaller formations. GEBRAK has a much more anti-system orientation, heading its May Day statement with “Fight Capitalism, Imperialism and Militarism”. It has no single central figure.

At the Monas rally, Prabowo made several promises, including the formation of a task force to mitigate lay-offs and decrease the commissions taken by ride-hailing companies such as Grab and Gojek from their drivers. The unions’ main request was for an end to outsourcing – the use of labour-hire arrangements under which workers have no job security and forfeit many legally mandated benefits. Outsourcing has contributed to lower earnings for most workers.

Among all workers, including those in the informal sector, at least 80 per cent now earn less than the official minimum wage. Even in the formal sector, workers employed through labour-hire companies can fall below that threshold.