Felix Anthony
Faiz Khan clarifies issues raised by Anthony
By RACHNA LAL
The Fiji Sugar and General Workers Union has disputed sabotage claims at Tropik Wood Industries linking the union with the alleged sabotage.
This follows comments from Pine Group of Companies executive chairman, Faiz Khan, labeling repeated incidents at the chipping plant and boiler as sabotage.
Mr Khan said some incidents had become far too regular over the past one week.
One example he gave was a large size metal repeatedly entering their chip plant causing damage to the chipper knives, shear bolts and clamps and consequently causing operational downtime.
However, union general secretary, Felix Anthony, said this was merely an attempt to hoodwink the public and get sympathy.
“The fact is that a piece of metal that fell in the chipper was a clamp that holds the small wood chipper knife which went loose,” he said.
“This is not the main chipper. This was not the doing of any worker and not the first time this has happened and is a mechanical issue.
“In fact, when this accident happened, a manager and a supervisor were present and witnessed it and have full knowledge of what happened.”
But, Mr Khan stressed they were are talking about repeated incidents of sabotage over a period of a week, not just one incident.
“It is not common for metal pieces and foreign objects to enter the chipper from a pile of logs,” he said.
Concerns over pay
Meanwhile, Mr Anthony claimed it was Mr Khan rather who was sabotaging the company by over-paying himself.
Mr Anthony claimed Mr Khan gets a salary being more than $300,000 for a part time job and a bonus of more than $200,000.
To this, Mr Khan responded saying he did not determine his pay neither did Government.
“My pay is determined independently by PriceWaterhouseCoopers and approved unanimously by our board for what value I provide to our four companies,” he said.
“For the information of everyone, the previous base salary of two executives in Fiji Pine Limited and Tropik Wood Industries Limited was $720,000, for less than the work I do.
“My base salary is well below $300,000.”
Achievements highlighted
For clarifications sake, Mr Khan gave a breakdown of some of his achievements in the past two years and 10 months he has been in the Pine industry.
Below are his achievements
l Paid off $29 million of debt some dating back to 1985
l Spent more than $10 million in capital upgrades through operational cash flow
l Spent $4 million from operational cash flow in planting pine to return the industry to sustainability
l Got Wairiki chipping operations up and running
l Improved each and every workers pay on their own
“Our new philosophy is simple – clean the dirt, become transparent and let everyone aspire to perform and climb the ladder of promotions,” Mr Khan said.
Workers right
Mr Anthony further claimed that Mr Khan had no regard for workers’ rights.
“He has declared that he will deal with bargaining agents for workers but not their union,” he said.
“His declaration of a 10 per cent wage increase for all workers in return for the denial of their fundamental rights is shameful.”
Mr Khan however stated there was no denial of any rights of the workers.
“All our workers will have a say from a bargaining unit made up of their own employees,” he said.
“What right is Felix talking about when he recently just a month ago disputed the pay rise we gave to our boiler employees (his former members of FSGWU) simply because we gave the pay rise directly, and Felix felt threatened he was losing grip?
“We will give more in the future based on performance and profitability and look after our workers.”
Unused sick leave bonus
Furthermore, Mr Anthony said Mr Khan’s comment saying the 1.5 times unused sick leave bonus had nothing to do with the union was incorrect.
“There is a union and company agreement that obliges the company to pay. This benefit was negotiated by the union,” he said.
Mr Khan reiterated that the 1.5 times bonus pay for all unused sick leave benefit was not negotiated by the union saying it was entirely a company initiative.
“The union puts all its negotiations in writing by way of log of claims,” he said.
Mr Khan therefore asked the union to show this to them.