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16 June, 2008
ICEM Regional Vice President Rayford Mbulu chaired the GUF’s Sub-Sahara Africa Regional Meeting 9 June in Accra, Ghana. The conference, attended by 35 delegates, adopted a four-point programme aimed at building trade union power in the region. Mbulu is the General Secretary of the Mineworkers’ Union of Zambia (MUZ).
Delegates attended from Botswana, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Guinea, Namibia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Tanzania, Togo, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
The action programme adopted target points in four areas: Collective Bargaining and Campaigns; Socio-Economic Issues; Politics; and Health and Safety.
Collective Bargaining and Campaigns:
The regional delegates vowed to support the bargaining process for a living wage by the host union, the Ghana Mine Workers’ Union (GMWU), and called on all ICEM affiliates in the region not to agree to wage increases that fall under the rate of inflation in their respective countries, in light of escalating food and energy price increases.
Delegates also endorsed and pledged to emphasize the global labour and the International Trade Union Confederation’s “World Day for Decent Work” on 7 October 2008, a day of mobilization to end poverty and inequality, to establish rights at work for working women and men, and to establish Solidarity between trade unions on bilateral and multilateral levels.
The statement also pledged to support a Women’s Charter to enhance the role of women within all ICEM affiliates, and within the ICEM itself. And it called upon employers to further facilitate HIV education, testing, and access to anti-retroviral medication.
Socio-Economic Issues:
The conference condemned the xenophobic attacks on foreign nationals in South Africa.
Politics:
Delegates called upon leaders of countries in the region to ensure free and fair balloting in the run-off elections in Zimbabwe later this month. Regarding Somalia, delegates condemned the eruption of conflict, which has claimed the loss of many lives and has deeply affected the working class of the country.
The regional conference also implored the citizens of the Niger Delta in Nigeria to embrace dialogue, and requested that the Nigerian government link dialogue with the urgency to create a sustainable infrastructure and human resource development for citizens in that region. Delegates also urged multinational companies operating in Nigeria to partner with trade unions and other stakeholders in order to institute a socially viable peace and cooperation in the area.
Health and Safety:
The conference took notice of the 8 June coal mine explosion in the Ukraine, resulting in 12 deaths, and called for immediate improvements toward safe mining practices across the world. Delegates also called for added attention by employers, governments, and trade unions on the dangers faced by uranium miners, and for an increase in work by the ICEM in this area.