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7 May, 2007
The ICEM teamed with the International Transport Workers´ Federation (ITF) in applying pressure on President Joseph Kabila of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The ICEM also lodged strong protest to Kabila over the dispute by workers at the Société Minière de Bakwanga (MIBA), a diamond extraction company.
The transport matter concerned the unfair and arbitrary arrest of trade unionist Leon Ngoy Bululu, vice-president of ITF-affiliated Solidarité Syndicale des Travailleurs et Cadres du Congo (SOLIDARITE).
He was arrested on 20 April 2007, following an appearance on a 14 March television programme on the Molière channel. In the broadcast, he reportedly spoke out against ongoing mismanagement of the national transport company, Office National des Transports (ONATRA). Mr. Bululu was arrested at his office by agents of the Brigade Criminelle du parquet de la Gombe and detained, following a complaint by the management of the transport company.
ONATRA employs 17,800 workers throughout DRC’s five provinces: Kinshasa, Bas-Congo, Bandungu, Equateur and the Province Orientale. Among the issues raised by Comrade Bululu was the fact that the company keeps hiring new workers, over 1,200 recently, even though wages for current workers are delayed by four months.
Bululu was first imprisoned at the "Parquet de Grande Instance de la Gombe." Later, he was transferred to the notorious Makala prison, where he finds himself incarcerated without due and diligent legal processes. Efforts to find out more about his current condition have, so far, been without result.
Both ICEM and ITF call for his immediate release, which they say is clear and calculated trade union repression.
The diamond mining dispute at state-run Société Minière de Bakwanga (MIBA), a diamond extraction operation near Mbuji-Mayi, in south-central Kasai-Oriental Province, has forced a strike by workers also over non-payment of wages. The strike began 23 April.
MIBA is some seven months behind in paying wages.
A joint trade union delegation is furthermore demanding a return of social benefits that the government has taken away from diamond miners and others, and calls on the company to provide adequate equipment to guarantee health and safety.
Participating unions in the strike are FENAMICO, SYTRAME, CTP, GST, SYGEMI, SLC, FGTK, FTF, all of which are ICEM affiliates, and FOSYCO, which is affiliated to the International Energy & Mines Organisation (IEMO).