Egypt’s New Labor Movement Comes of Age
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This is a cross-post by Ben Moxham of Stronger Unions, the blog from the United Kingdom’s Trade Union Congress (TUC) on the new Egyptian trade union movement that has its roots in last year’s incredible uprising that toppled the Mubarak government.
Shawna Bader-Blau, executive director of the AFL-CIO’s Solidarity Center, and Lisa McGowan, acting director of the Middle East and North Africa program at the Solidarity Center, participated in the historic founding Congress of the Egyptian Federation of Independent Trade Unions (EFITU). The Congress represented an important step forward in the struggle by Egyptian workers to form free and independent unions.
On the desert-battered outskirts of Cairo, in a kitsch marble convention center, the Egyptian Federation of Independent Trade Unions (EFITU) has just announced to Egypt and the world that it has come of age. EFITU was born in the inspiration and chaos of Tahrir square, exactly 12 months to the day. Since then they have been organizing, organizing and organizing. Today was a chance to show the results and I was blown away.
The federation claims to have organized a phenomenal 2 million workers into 200 unions in barely a year. Of course, many of the new independent unions have their roots in the underground workers’ struggles throughout the past decade. And without clear ways to keep membership records, the total figure may be in doubt, but as an accurate figure emerges it will still be the single most impressive organizing effort I’ve ever come across (and this is just one of the two new independent federations: the Egyptian Democratic Labor Congress [EDLC] claims to have signed up 214 unions with a seven figure combined membership also).
Legitimacy means everything to this nascent movement. So long denied a voice in the workplace and a voice in society, they are determined to be democratic and everywhere. “We bid farewell to land-lord run unions” of Mubarak, said Kamal Abou Aita, the acting president of EFITU.
And they did so in meticulous-style: each of the 264 delegates would vote, one-by-one, walking up onto the congress stage, showing their ID, filing out their ballot and putting it in a large glass box for the entire hall to see. “How powerful is that?” I thought after the first few votes. “How long will this take?” I thought after three hours and only 140 delegates in. More hours passed and I realized that these guys have pyramid-building patience and that I’d nodded off and drooled a bit.
But by then the party had set in. Us international guests filed some dead air time by firing off our best Read the rest of this entry »
Executive Council Praises Middle East Workers Fighting for Freedom
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The AFL-CIO Executive Council today praised the role workers and independent trade unions are playing in the popular mobilizations against corrupt, oppressive regimes in Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain and throughout the Middle East and North Africa.
Meeting at the National Labor College in Silver Spring, Md., the council said in a statement:
After enduring decades of repression exercised by governments with the support of the West, including the United States, the workers and people of Tunisia and Egypt have mobilized by the millions for democracy and fundamental rights. The AFL-CIO and the global labor movement salute the independent trade union movements in both of these countries and support their aspirations for social justice.
Read the full statement here.
Global Solidarity Goes Both Ways
International solidarity travels both ways. Workers under attack in the United States have received strong support from workers around the world and they have come to the aid of their brothers and sisters when they needed help and support.
Next Monday, as part of the We Are One mobilization on and around April 4, workers and activists in Paris will march to show their solidarity with U.S. workers. Democrats Abroad Paris, the sponsor of the march, says in a statement: “We’re standing together for rights for all workers to bargain for a middle class life, our right to a voice in the political process and the respect that all people deserve.”
Back in the United Staes, the more than 65,000 Wisconsin workers represented by AFSCME Councils 24, 40 and 48 donated nearly $50,000 to an earthquake relief fund established by RENGO, Japan’s trade union confederation on behalf of all AFSCME members nationwide.
ILO Praises Egypt’s First Steps on Workers’ Rights
For decades under former President Hosni Mubarak, Egypt was one of the countries often cited by the International Labor Organization (ILO) as restricting or denying workers’ freedom to join a union. This week, the ILO praised the new Egyptian leaders for taking the first steps towards recognizing that basic human right.
ILO Director General Juan Somavia said:
The recognition of the rights of all trade unions to be registered and conduct freely their legitimate activities opens the door for a new era where the right to freedom of association will be fully respected in law and in practice.
The right of all workers and employers in Egypt to form and join organizations that are independent and genuinely representative is a major step in the revolutionary changes taking place in Egypt.
Solis Stands With Public Workers in Struggle for Rights
With 10,000 members of the Communications Workers of America (CWA) on the line, U.S. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis earlier this week pledged her support for public employees struggling to save their right to bargain for good middle class jobs.
In a phone call to CWA members this week, Solis, who comes from a union family, said she is inspired and proud of the hundreds of thousands of union and non-union workers nationwide who are taking on the states’ aggressive anti-worker agendas. She said
Budget sacrifices are one thing but demanding that workers give up their voice is another. The governors aren’t just asking us to tighten our belts, they’re demanding we give up our uniquely American rights as workers.
The governors’ targets are “the men and women who care for our neighbors, teach our kids, keep our communities safe and clean, and run into burning buildings when others will not,” she said.
They do their work with little fanfare and don’t expect recognition, but through unions they have a voice in the workplace and in their future, and that’s what’s put us in the middle class.
Egyptian Union Leader: ‘Today Is the Day of the American Workers’
Kamal Abbas, general coordinator of the independent Egyptian Centre for Trade Unions and Workers Services (CTUWS), has sent an amazing message of solidarity to U.S. workers under assault by CEO-backed governors and state legislators. From Michael Moore’s website:
I am speaking to you from a place very close to Tahrir Square in Cairo, “Liberation Square,” which was the heart of the Revolution in Egypt. This is the place where many of our youth paid with their lives and blood in the struggle for our just rights.
From this place, I want you to know that we stand with you as you stood with us.
I want you to know that no power can challenge the will of the people when they believe in their rights. When they raise their voices loud and clear and struggle against exploitation.
No one believed that our revolution could succeed against the strongest dictatorship in the region. But in 18 days the revolution achieved the victory of the people….
We want you to know that we stand on your side. Stand firm and don’t waiver. Don’t give up on your rights. Victory always belongs to the people who stand firm and demand their just rights.
We and all the people of the world stand on your side and give you our full support.
As our just struggle for freedom, democracy and justice succeeded, your struggle will succeed. Victory belongs to you when you stand firm and remain steadfast in demanding your just rights.
Check out the video and transcript.
The CTUWS was co-recipient of last year’s AFL-CIO George Meany-Lane Kirkland Human Rights Award on behalf of the Egyptian workers. It also received the French Republic’s Human Rights Award.
World’s Unions Call for End of Violence in Bahrain
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The global union movement is demanding that authorities in Bahrain immediately cease their violent repression of peaceful demonstrations and start talks with the trade union movement and other groups on the concrete demands they and the demonstrators have expressed.
Hundreds of police swept through the Pearl Roundabout in Manama in pre-dawn raids, killing at least two protesters and injuring some 70 more. Security forces blocked access to the Roundabout, stopping the evacuation of the dead and injured, and a temporary clinic there also was attacked and medical staff injured.
Nurses Launch ‘ProtestInTheUSA’ News Line to Encourage Protests
Inspired by the popular protests in Egypt, around the world and in states like Wisconsin, National Nurses United (NNU) today launched a news line designed to help coordinate and encourage grassroots protests in the United States.
The news line will live at www.Twitter.com/ProtestInTheUSA and bring together notices, reports and videos from protests concerning democracy, health care, workers’ rights and human rights, among other issues. All individuals and groups in favor of basic democratic values are invited to join and share protests.
NNU Executive Director Rose Ann DeMoro says:
With so many families and working people in America in trouble, with the recession, health care crisis, staggering disparity in income, and the ongoing corporate chokehold of our economic and political structure, more and more people will be taking to the streets calling for real change. If you’re not protesting, you’re not paying attention. It’s up to all of us to help spread the fire.
Egypt Workers’ Strikes Added New Strength to Protests
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The resignation of Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak comes one day after huge numbers of workers went on strike to protest working conditions, adding a new and powerful emphasis to the massive ongoing protests throughout the country.
Thousands of workers are on strike across Egypt, including workers in factories, railway and bus workers, state electricity staff and service technicians at the Suez Canal.
More than 6,000 Suez Canal Co. workers in the port cities of Suez, Port Said and Ismailia began an open-ended sit-in yesterday and vowed not to go home until their demands are met. They are protesting poor wages and deteriorating health and working conditions. Read the rest of this entry »
Egypt’s Workers Strike for Democracy and Rights
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The international trade union movement has sent a strong message of support to tens of thousands of striking Egyptian workers as they continue to fight for democracy, social justice and trade union rights.
Workers are striking in dozens of cities throughout the country. Railway and bus workers, state electricity staff and service technicians at the Suez Canal and workers in factories manufacturing textiles, steel and beverages and at least one hospital are all on strike.
The workers are infuriated over reports that the family of President Hosni Mubarak has amassed a fortune worth billions of dollars while some 40 percent of the country’s 80 million people live below or near the internationally defined poverty line of $2 a day, according to the World Bank.
