President of The Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) Faruque Hassan on Tuesday warned that a group of outsiders is instigating the innocent garments workers to create unrest in the industry before announcement of a new pay structure for the sector.

He said the government may announce the new minimum wage for garment workers by November and the BGMEA member factories would implement it by December. So there is no logic to workers' unrest and movement before announcement of the wage.

Faruque said this at a press conference on the recent worker unrest centering and minimum wage in the garment sector held at the BGMEA Building at Uttara in Dhaka on Tuesday.

“We hope that the Minimum Wage Board will announce the new pay structure by November and whatever the government announces as the new salary structure, all the entrepreneurs in the garment industry will accept it, no matter how many challenges there are in the industry. The new wage structure will be effective from next December,” said BGMEA president.

He said, “We are fully aware, of how much our workers brothers, and sisters are suffering due to the increase in the cost of goods as well as living costs at the local for recent international. We sympathize with every entrepreneur in their suffering.”

“One of the main responsibilities of our entrepreneurs is to keep every worker brothers and sisters as well as possible. Workers are the lifeblood of our garment industry. If they are good, the industry will be good,” he added.

Farooq said, "We are deeply concerned, for the past few days, due to the instigation of outsiders, workers in some garment factories are leaving the factory without working, vandalizing the factory, as a result, many entrepreneurs are forced to close the factory.”

More worrying is that due to the incitement of outsiders, various institutions including garment factories, leather factories, chemical go-downs, fabric go-downs, and shops have also been damaged, he said.