On March 6, more than 30 foreign workers from Stargood Construction staged a sit-down protest at the construction site of the old Central Provident Fund Building, along Maxwell Link.

Sit-down protest began on March 4

According to Today, the protest began on March 4 morning, with the workers spending a few hours per day on-site protesting.

Those involved in the protest claimed that 59 of them had been unpaid -- more than half are from Bangladesh, with the remaining coming from India and China.

The amount allegedly came up to nearly S$300,000 for work done from December 2018 to February 2019 on the aforementioned site.

"Delayed payments are the norm in the industry"

Stargood Construction owner Lin Jie Biao admitted that the workers' claims were true, according to Today.

Lin claimed that this was due to a delay in payment from the project's main contractor, Shimizu Corporation, which had not paid up for his company's work since December 2018:

"I'm so broke, I don’t even have S$50 in my pocket right now".

Despite the delayed payments, Lin told Today that his company had continued work on-site anyway.

He added that "delayed payments are the norm in the industry".

Incurred an additional charge of S$700,000 instead

Lin told Today that Stargood had incurred a "back charge" of over S$700,000 from Shimizu.

This charge included third-party fees such as outsourcing the assembly of materials and administrative fees.

Lin has since disputed the costs, claiming that he has been overcharged and that he would be about S$500,000 in debt because of this project.

MOM to assist workers

An MOM's spokesperson cited in Today said that the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management is assisting the workers on the issue.

Affected workers are also scheduled to meet MOM representatives on March 18, 2019.

Here's what the police said when Mothership.sg reached out for a statement on the matter:

"On 6 March 2019 at 9.46am, the Police received a call for assistance at 79 Robinson Road. The parties involved were advised accordingly. No further police assistance was required."

Top image via Google Maps