NEARLY 3,000 workers are welcome to return to their posts at the Supertex garment factory in Meanchey district’s Chakangre Krom commune today, just nine days after the factory was engulfed in a fire blamed on faulty electrical wiring, a factory official said.

Meanwhile, the municipal fire chief said he would be willing to open an investigation into the blaze if asked to do so by the company’s insurer, but that he had not yet determined whether the factory was insured.

“The police authority fire brigade is prepared to open an investigative committee to research the real cause of the fire,” said Net Vantha, director of the Phnom Penh Municipal Fire Department.

Mann, a factory administration official who declined to give his full name, said he could not confirm whether the factory was insured but that factory operations would resume on Monday.

“If any workers are absent on Monday, we will cut their bonus,” he warned.

Ken Loo, secretary general of the Garment Manufacturers Association of Cambodia, said he believed the company was covered by a local insurance provider, and that it would be normal procedure for a complaint filed by an insurance company to be investigated.

“It is Net Vantha’s duty to investigate, but regardless the insurance company would make their own investigations before any claim was made,” he said.

Supertex is a former subsidiary of Tack Fat Group International Ltd, which went into voluntary liquidation in July 2008.