Observation (CEACR) - adoptée 2008, publiée 98ème session CIT (2009)

Article 12, paragraph 1, and Article 15(c) of the Convention. Payment of wages at regular intervals. The Committee notes with regret that the Government has not, as the Committee asked in its previous comments, provided information on the situation concerning the problem of non-payment or late payment of wages and on the practical measures taken to ensure that wages are paid at regular intervals, including information on inspection carried out, breaches of the provisions of the Labour Code regarding wage protection, and the measures taken to resolve them. The Committee understands that there have been delays in the payment of wages in certain instances, for example at the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure. The Committee reminds the Government that, as it pointed out in its General Survey of 2003 on the protection of wages (paragraph 355), “the quintessence of wage protection is the assurance of a periodic payment allowing the worker to organize his everyday life with a reasonable degree of certainty and security”, and that consequently, “the delayed payment of wages or the accumulation of wage debts clearly contravene the letter and the spirit of the Convention”. The Committee again asks the Government to provide detailed information on the measures taken to eliminate delays in the payment of wages.

Article 12, paragraph 2. Settlement of wages due upon termination of a contract of employment. The Committee notes that, according to section 68 of Decree No. 50-2005 of 8 August 2005 regulating industrial export processing zones, labour relations in the zones are governed by the Labour Code or by the legislation on the public service, as the case may be. It notes, however, the report on the human rights situation in Nicaragua in 2007 issued by the Nicaraguan Human Rights Centre, which refers to serious breaches of workers’ rights in the export processing zones. This report refers to several enterprises in the zones which have dismissed workers – and in some cases have closed down – without settling the wages owed to the workers concerned. The Committee reminds the Government that “the principle of the regular payment of wages, as set out in Article 12 of the Convention, finds its full expression not only in the periodicity of wage payments, as may be regulated by national laws and regulations or collective agreements, but also in the complementary obligation to settle swiftly and in full all outstanding payments upon the termination of the contract
of employment” (General Survey of 2003 on the protection of wages, paragraph 398). Given the seriousness of the situation described in the report of the Nicaraguan Human Rights Centre, the Committee asks the Government to provide all available information on the abovementioned practices and to indicate the measures taken to enforce the legislation on wage protection in the enterprises concerned.

The Committee is raising other matters in a request addressed directly to the Government.