Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Sindacalisti Irakeni arrestati senza motivo. Le leggi anti-Sindacali si Saddam mantenute dalla coalizione.

Evviva la "liberta'"
 On Saturday 6 December 2003 US occupation forces using about ten
armoured
cars and dozens of soldiers attacked the temporary headquarters of the
Iraqi Federation of Workers Trade Unions (IFTU) in the Karkh District
of
Baghdad and arrested eight IFTU leaders who were subsequently
released.
The soldiers ransacked and destroyed IFTU possessions, including
posters
and banners condemning terrorism, covering the federation's name with
black paint, smashing windows, seizing documents, without any
explanation
or reason.
Please send this message to President Bush today demanding a full
investigation, at
http://www.labourstart.org/cgi-bin/solidarityforever/show_campaign.cgi?c=22
http://news.pacificnews.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=0ea74f4207000f2a20cd2bdf4ab0e2a9
http://www.progressive.org/dec03/bac1203.html
Saddam's Labor Laws Live On
Most Iraqi workers hoped the fall of Saddam Hussein would liberate
them,
enabling them to recover their lost rights. Chief among them was the
right
to an independent union. In 1987, the regime of Saddam Hussein
reclassified most Iraqi workers--those who labored in the huge state
enterprises that are the heart of the country's economy--as civil
servants. As such, they were prohibited from forming unions and
bargaining.
The occupation, however, didn't lift this decree. It is still in
force, as
privatization looms like a sword of Damocles over those workers and
the
factories on which they depend for survival. And while keeping in
place
the ban on unions, the occupation authorities have kept wages low and
unemployment high.
For Iraqi workers, the signal could not be clearer: The overthrow of
Saddam did not bring liberation.
Iraq has a long history of labor and radical activity, born in the
fight
against Britain's six-year occupation at the end of World War I.
Starting
with oil, railroad, and dock workers, unions mounted strike after
strike,
which the British suppressed at gunpoint, often killing strikers. The
monarchy the British installed, lasting until 1958, continued to make
union organizing illegal. After the 1958 revolution, unions and
radical
political parties were able to come above ground for the first time.
But
in 1963, the CIA helped mount a coup against the Kassem government,
and
the Ba'ath Party took over. In 1977, Saddam Hussein purged the unions
and
made radical parties illegal again. Many labor activists were
executed,
and others fled into exile.
Following the fall of the Saddam regime in April, organizers of the
independent unions resurfaced. In Basra, they mounted a strike two
days
after the arrival of British troops, demanding the right to organize
and
protesting the appointment of a Ba'ath Party member as the new mayor.
In
June, 400 union activists met in Baghdad, forming the Workers
Democratic
Trade Union Federation. The group laid plans to reorganize unions in
twelve of the country's main industries.
After that meeting, organizers fanned out to workplaces, including the
Al
Daura oil refinery, located just outside Baghdad. There they
encouraged
workers in each of the nine departments to elect union committees and
to
choose leaders for the entire installation. While the plant manager
seemed
willing to talk with the union, he was not able to sign any kind of
contract with the federation. The refinery and all other state
enterprises
are still covered by the law issued by Saddam in 1987.
Since the arrival of troops in April, unions and workers have been
demanding that the occupation authorities repudiate this law, as they
have
with many others issued under the Saddam regime. The occupation
authorities in this case, however, have been silent. In the absence of
a
new order repealing the old decree, it remains in force, prohibiting
any
form of collective bargaining for most Iraqi workers. In particular,
it
affects those workers who are employed in enterprises set to be
privatized. If those workers have no legal union, no right to bargain,
and
no contracts, the privatization of the plants--and the huge job losses
that will come with it--will be much more difficult to oppose.
"At the beginning, we thought our situation might get better after we
got
rid of Saddam. But it hasn't," says Jassim Mashkoul, director of
communications of the trade union federation.
The new Iraqi state is a case study in the free market unleashed. The
Bush
Administration foresees two ways the Iraqi economy will be
transformed,
and it is taking measures to ensure that workers don't disrupt either
one.
First, it will privatize the old state enterprises that have employed
most
workers. Second, it will create favorable conditions for an army of
(mostly U.S.) corporations to set up shop and repatriate their profits
outside the country.
On September 19, the Coalition Provisional Authority published Order
No.
39, which permits 100 percent foreign ownership of businesses, except
for
the oil industry, and allows repatriation of profits. Order No. 37,
published the same day, suspends income and property taxes for the
year,
and limits taxes on individuals and corporations in the future to 15
percent.
In an October 8 phone press conference, Thomas Foley, director of
private
sector development for the Coalition Provisional Authority, announced
that
he would soon propose to the Iraqi Governing Council a list of the
first
state enterprises to be sold off. While promising to exclude the oil
wells, electrical generation stations, and banks (at least at first),
he
mentioned cement and fertilizer plants, phosphate and sulfur mines,
pharmaceutical factories, and the country's airline. Some 138 of 600
state-owned enterprises have already been offered for sale, according
to
some reports.
Dathar Al-Kashab, who was appointed to manage the Al Daura refinery
two
months ago, having been an engineer there since 1966, predicts that
privatization would have an enormous effect. "A worker starting here
today
has a job for life under the old system. There is no law that permits
me
to lay him off. But if I put on the hat of privatization, I'll have to
fire 1,500 [of the refinery's 3,000] workers," he says. "In America
when a
company lays people off, there's unemployment insurance, and they
won't
die from hunger. If I dismiss employees now, I'm killing them and
their
families."
At the state-owned Mamoun Factory of Vegetable Oils, production is
low,
and many of the plant's injection molding machines, which make plastic
bottles for the oil, are disabled. Replacement parts were unavailable
during twelve years of sanctions, and the plant was inspected twenty
times
as a possible site for chemical weapons production. Today, the plant's
771
workers worry that despite the lack of repairs, the factory's huge
assets
make it a prime candidate for sale to a private owner. Iraqi
newspapers
are already carrying stories on possible buyers.
"There's no private person in Iraq with enough money to buy this
place,"
says manager Amir Faraj Bhajet. "It would have to be a foreign owner.
They
would like the assets, but would they want the workers?"
Despite the hostility of the Coalition Provisional Authority, the fall
of
the Saddam regime has led to an explosion of workplace organizing
activity. Low wages are one motivation. The Iraqi government employs
70
percent of the workforce. The authority has set an emergency pay
scale.
Though The New York Times says wages are going up, that's not what I
found. Most workers get about $60 a month, a small group gets $120,
and a
tiny minority (mostly administrators and managers) $180. This is the
same
wage scale that prevailed under the last few years of the Saddam
Hussein
regime.
"The current emergency wage is totally incapable of supporting us,"
says
one worker at the Al Daura oil refinery, complaining anonymously for
fear
that he would lose his job.
In the last month, the refinery has seen three work stoppages. Workers
congregated in front of the management office to demand a pay hike.
At the General State Leather Industry Factory, the largest shoe
factory in
the Middle East, one worker explains how she is supporting six people
in
her family on $120 a month. "The price of food and clothing is going
up
rapidly, and the salary is very low. We work hard, and I've been here
ten
years. I have to have a raise," she pleads. On the day I visit the
leather
factory, workers there organize a march to the labor ministry,
complaining
about their manager and the wages.
These are not the only such demonstrations. Similar protests have been
going on at workplaces throughout the country.
The $87 billion that Congress just passed is not going to be used to
increase wages or implement a huge jobs program. About 70 percent of
the
workforce--seven to eight million people--are unemployed. Nuri Jafer,
assistant to the Iraqi minister of labor, describes in glowing terms
his
idea for a new system of unemployment benefits. He says he hopes to
pay a
survival income "without removing the motivation from people to go out
and
find jobs." Leaving aside his rote repetition of the free-marketeers'
horror that poor people might lose their desire to work, Nuri's
explanation had one other major problem. "Unfortunately," he concedes,
"we
have yet to find any country willing to help us fund it."
Working conditions are exhausting and dangerous. At the Al Daura
refinery,
Detrala Beshab, president of the refinery's new union, notes that
while
the workday is officially seven hours, the day shift is actually
eleven
hours long, and the night shift thirteen hours. Since workers are paid
by
the month, there is no overtime pay. "When we talked to the manager,
he
told us he had to talk to the oil ministry, which had to talk to the
finance ministry, which had to get permission from the coalition
forces,"
he says. "The coalition forces control the finances--and our wages."
The workers' situation is so desperate that the refinery gives them
motor
oil every month to make up for their low income. On the highway
outside
the plant, the sons of refinery workers have set up little roadside
stands
selling it to passing cars.
In Saddam's time, no one could afford to retire. "The pension wasn't
enough to pay a taxi to collect the check," Beshab says with a laugh.
But
the refinery and every other state enterprise did pay other important
benefits. There was a system of bonuses and profit-sharing, which
often
was as much as the salary itself, and a food subsidy, as well. All
those
benefits disappeared when the occupation authorities took over.
Essentially, workers have suffered a drastic cut in income since April
as
a result of decisions by the Coalition Provisional Authority. And a
jump
in the exchange rate has made imports more expensive--in effect,
another
cut in salary.
No one in the refinery, except the fire department, has boots or
gloves.
Safety glasses are unknown. "Lots of us have breathing problems, and
there
are accidents in which people get burned," explains union member Rajid
Hassan. If workers get hurt or sick, they have to pay for their own
medical care, and they lose pay for the time they're off the job.
At the shoe and vegetable oil factories, another new labor group
called
the Workers' Unions and Councils began organizing workers this summer.
With its encouragement, shoe factory workers formed a union and
demanded
legal recognition. Like workers at the refinery, they complained about
With its encouragement, shoe factory workers formed a union and
demanded
legal recognition. Like workers at the refinery, they complained about
long hours without overtime pay, no vacations, and the disappearance
of
their extra pay when the occupation started. "Life has gotten much
worse,"
one worker says. "Everything is controlled by the coalition. We don't
control anything."
About fifty people set off from the plant to the labor ministry on
October
11 to demand legal status, while other workers who stayed behind
explained
their demands. They spoke openly, but nevertheless feared to give
their
names, saying they might be subject to retaliation. One of their
leaders
declared that although he'd organized the march, the factory's
managers
had forbidden him to participate in it.
"We're demanding the right to form a union," he explains, "which must
have
full authority to represent workers here." Workers don't see the plant
management as the real boss. "The administration just represents the
ministry," he says. "We must change this law that says we don't have
to
right to a union. If the law doesn't change, we'll change it anyway,
like
it or not."
The factory's technical manager confirmed that it had sent a letter to
the
ministry of mineral industries and resources, asking if the company
could
negotiate with the new union. No, came the reply.
Even without legal status, however, unions are finding ways to operate
and
win some demands. In the vegetable oil factory, the union was
successfully
able to force managers to rehire some workers who had been fired under
Saddam for belonging to the Al Daiwa Party. That party, banned under
Saddam, now is a member of the Iraqi Governing Council.
The new union's demands include reclassifying the workers so they can
receive higher salaries, lifting the punishment of other banned former
employees, and reinstating profit-sharing. The union hopes to sign up
members in other state-owned factories. "A major reason for our
existence
is to eliminate the laws issued by the Ba'ath regime," says its
general
secretary, Majeed Sahib Kareem.
"For us, war and occupation are a reality," declares Abdullah Muhsin,
the
federation's international representative. "We stood against the war
before it started, but we couldn't stop it. Now our concern is to help
our
country and protect our members."
The federation wants Saddam's government-affliated union structure to
be
dissolved. And it is demanding that the benefit funds and buildings be
turned over to the new unions. The occupation authorities have turned
a
deaf ear to these appeals.
Another leader of the federation, Muhsen Mull Ali, spent two long
stints
in prison for organizing unions in Basra. "They will reimpose
capitalism
on us, so our responsibility is to oppose privatization as much as
possible, and fight for the welfare of our workers," he says.
That fight is particularly difficult in the midst of a war against
occupation. If the armed conflict intensifies, the political space may
close.
Keeping open the space for unions to organize and for workers to gain
some
control over the economic decisions that will affect their lives is
not a
concern of Iraqis alone. Union leaders from Britain, France, and the
International Labor Organization have visited Iraq to press for
workers'
rights.
Arab trade unionists are among the most adamant. "War makes
privatization
easy: First you destroy the society, and then you let the corporations
rebuild it," says Hacene Djemam, general secretary of the
International
Confederation of Arab Trade Unions.
Meanwhile, labor peace activists in the United States have begun to
reach
out to the new Iraqi unions. U.S. Labor Against the War, which brought
together unions and labor councils that opposed the Bush intervention
before it took place, is speaking up again. It has announced it will
mount
a national campaign to oppose privatization, get the 1987 law lifted,
and
expose the violations of labor rights in Iraq. "We need Congressional
hearings into the union-busting actions by the U.S. occupation
authorities
in Iraq," says Clarence Thomas, of the San Francisco Longshore local.
"If
unions here knew what's being done in our name over there, they'd be
outraged."
A delegation from U.S. Labor Against the War visited Iraq in October
to
investigate conditions. The group had a formal meeting with Nuri of
the
Iraqi labor ministry. He was asked three times whether the 1987 law
would
be repealed. Each time he made a long speech but in the end failed to
answer the question. Sitting on a couch next to him in his ornate
office
was Leslie Findley, a British representative of the Coalition
Provisional
Authority, who is assigned to oversee the ministry. She was asked the
same
question and also refused to answer. Then she complained about the
number
of foreign union delegations visiting the ministry. "I'm going to tell
the
minister that these are taking too much of his time, and recommend
that he
concentrate instead on doing his job."

unemployed.
Peccato che non porta alcuna prova.
-Stefano