WWP hosts meeting on workers’ struggles

The Durham, N.C., branch of Workers World Party hosted a forum June 29 titled “Rebel Against Capitalism.” The meeting drew connections between the major struggles of workers, students and oppressed peoples going on in Greece and Spain and those occurring across the U.S.

Gilbert Johnson, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union local representing trade workers at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, spoke to the forum via Skype. He gave a powerful update on the day-to-day struggles of workers and the community in Wisconsin to combat Gov. Scott Walker’s recently passed bill to take away collective bargaining rights for public workers.

Speaking for the North Carolina Public Service Workers Union, United Electrical Workers Local 150, Ashaki Binta talked about how the struggle in Wisconsin is the same as the historic struggle in North Carolina, where public workers are denied the right to collectively bargain because of a Jim Crow-type law passed in 1959 that is still on the books today.

Workers World Party member Ben Carroll updated the crowd about the struggles against austerity by workers in Greece and Spain. The meeting occurred the day after a major two-day national general strike in Greece organized by the PAME labor confederation and only a day before the call for a major general strike by workers in Britain.

— Report & photo by Dante Strobino