City’s bus drivers to get salary increase

A bus driver travels down Phnom Penh's Monivong Boulevard in a city bus earlier this month. Pha Lina

City’s bus drivers to get salary increase

Wed, 27 April 2016 ppp

Sen David

More than a year after several drivers resigned amid protests for higher wages, the Phnom Penh municipality yesterday announced it would be significantly increasing salaries for drivers and ticket takers on the city’s public buses starting in June.

After a meeting yesterday with City Governor Pa Socheatvong, the director of the Autonomous City Bus Transportation Authority, Ean Sokhim, said it had been decided that city bus drivers would see their salaries increase from $180 a month to $250, and that ticket sellers’ salaries would be bumped from $130 to $160.

“It is very good news for them to support their family and to improve the city bus service,” Sokhim said.

With 92 drivers and 92 ticket takers working on the capital’s 43 buses, the total salaries come to around $37,720 a month. The buses, meanwhile, earn the city between 170 million and 180 million riel (about $42,500 to $45,000) a month, Sokhim said.

Seven drivers resigned from the city bus service in January of 2015 after unsuccessfully striking for $300 a month.