African & Indian workers in struggle

CHAD

Government workers went on strike Jan. 9. They took the action because pensions had not been paid for three years, raises due at the beginning of 2005 had been withheld and other smaller demands had not been met.

The strike was militant. According to Gabon’s news service, strikers occupied the east entrance of the presidential palace for 10 days until anti-riot police took it back. The union involved and the retirees held a number of demonstrations in N’Djamena, Chad’s capital.

Michel Barka, president of Chad’s lar gest labor union, UST—United Unions of Chad—said, “We made it clear that these aged people are very fragile and not to pay their pensions would be a serious misstep on the part of the government.”

Jean-Baptiste Laokole, a retired civil servant and head of a group representing retired government workers, widows and orphans, said, “What we regret is that aged people have to come out into the streets and holler and protest in order for the government to pay them.”

While Chad is a very poor, landlocked country, with an unsettled border with the Darfur region of the Sudan, it recently has been getting substantial revenue from its oil. But this revenue has been severely restricted by the World Bank.

On Jan. 31 the Chadian government came up with some of the pension payments and raises, without specifying how.

The UST suspended the strike until Feb. 28. If the other issues and complete payments haven’t been settled by then, workers will begin a series of three-day strikes.

BENIN

The six major union confederations in Benin called a 48-hour strike Jan. 24 to demand that the government fully fund the presidential elections set for March 5.

Government officials were upset that the unions struck over political demands. The strike issued a warning that “the presidential elections be organized effectively, with openness and security.”

The strike immobilized the government, the private sector, garbage collection and the schools.

NIGERIA

The Nigerian government has decided to privatize its ports. According to the Vanguard, a Nigerian newspaper, the port workers in all the Nigerian ports have totally rejected the government’s pro posals for severance packages. They have voted to shut down the ports for three days as a warning before embarking on an indefinite strike to drive home their demands. They want their pensions guar anteed and their severance
packages honored.

Leaders of both Nigerian Port Authority Senior Staff Association and Maritime Works Union of Nigeria met on Feb. 1 to receive feedback from chapter executive committees and to strategize on how to mobilize dock workers to shut down the ports.

SOUTH AFRICA

The United Transport and Allied Trade Union (UTATU) and other unions just held a three-day strike against Transnet. The company, which is wholly state-owned and has a corporate structure, is being reorganized and partially privatized. It controls most of the transportation upon which South Africa’s economy relies—ports, railroads, airlines and a number of related businesses. This is the first strike against Transnet since it was founded more than 80 years ago.

Five thousand workers marched in Durban to mark the end of the strike. UTATU publicly said that Transnet’s attitude towards its workers was “insulting.”

While Transnet claimed that the strike was unsuccessful and caused no disruption, journalists counted an unusual number of ships waiting to unload in Durban harbor.

UTATU’s Chris de Vos said the pro spects of further work stoppages in the Northern Cape on Feb. 5, Eastern Cape on Feb. 13, Western Cape on Feb. 15 and in other provinces seemed more likely. A national transport strike is set for March 6.

How long the strikes will last is up to Transnet. “We had hoped that our KwaZulu-Natal stayaways would have been enough to make our point and end the need for further industrial action,” de Vos explained. He said instead of Trans net addressing workers’concerns, management came to the bargaining table with an array of “token” concessions.

The South African Communist Party issued a statement Feb. 2, which began: “The SACP wishes to express its full support and solidarity with the Transnet workers in challenging the manner in which the restructuring of Transnet is being handled.”

The statement continued, “The SACP supports this action fully aware of the impact that workers’ actions will have on major Transnet operations, which are vital to our economy.”

INDIA

Airport workers, who handle baggage and do the cleaning and trash removal, went back to work Feb. 5. They had gone out on strike for four days, until the government assured them and their unions that their jobs will be preserved.

The government is going to privatize the management of the airports in Delhi and Mumbai (Bombay), which handle about 65 percent of India’s air traffic—nearly 19 million people a year.

Communist parties strongly backed the strike.

After the airports became increasingly filthy and malodorous, more and more baggage was lost, and confrontations between the striking workers and the cops were growing sharper, the government promised that no jobs would be lost.