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29 January, 2007
The general strike that has paralysed the West African nation of Guinea since 10 January ended 27 January. The country’s unions, including ICEM mining affiliate SYNAMIC/ONSLG, reached a compromise with beleaguered President Lansana Conté to cede some of his near absolute powers.
Guinea’s trade unions, backed by some 14 opposition parties, forced Conté to concede authority to a yet-to-be-named prime minister, who will run the government. The ending of the strike also produced a pledge from Conté to immediately reduce fuel and food prices.
The ICEM reached SYNAMIC General Secretary Yamodou Touré last week, after he had been twice jailed by police and gendarmerie during the strike. Touré said he was among some 20 leaders who negotiated with Conté until late in the evening of 25 January. Earlier that day, a commission that included government officials, union leaders, and civil society representatives met to work out the new powers for the prime minister.
The 72-year-old Conté sacked former Prime Minister Cellou Dalein Diallo in April 2006. The strike started after Conté, in December, released one of Guinea’s wealthiest men, employers’ association leader Mamadou Sylla, and former minister Fode Soumah from prison. The two, both close associates of the reclusive president, had been imprisoned on corruption charges.
The peaceful general strike was met with heavy-handed force by Guinea’s riot police. At least 59 demonstrators were killed during the 18-day strike, including more than 30 on 22 January when police sprayed automatic weapons fire into a citizens’ protest in the capital city of Conakry.
Touré was among a handful of labour leaders arrested on 17 January as they led a group of some 200 demonstrators on a march to the National Parliament. The leaders were released later that day following negotiations led by National Assembly Speaker Aboubacar Sompare. Touré also serves as secretary general for the Organisation Nationale des Syndicats Libres de Guinée (ONSLG), one of the main national labour centres in Guinea.
He was arrested again five days later, on 22 January, the bloodiest day of the strike, when a presidential guard led by the president’s son, Ousmane Conté, stormed a union meeting. Some 30 trade union leaders were then taken to Conté’s home on the Samory military grounds near Conakry. They were released in the early morning hours of the next day.
Ironically, it was those arrests and late night meeting with Conté that set the stage for last week’s negotiated end to the general strike.
The strike brought Guinea, one of the world’s most impoverished countries, to a standstill. It crippled exports of bauxite, the country’s major cash source, after miners at one of the country’s bauxite mines, Sangaredi, downed tools.
Workers of the Christian miners’ union, FSAMCA, also played a key role in the strike, after they were told by their union to join the strike on 19 January. Miners belonging to all unions at the country’s national bauxite company, Compagnie des Bauxites de Guinée (CBG), effectively brought the company to a halt.
CBG is operated by Alcoa World Alumina, through its Halco joint venture with Canada’s Alcan, with the two North American companies owning 51% of the enterprise, and Guinea’s government the remainder. Russia’s giant aluminium producer Rusal also has substantial holdings in the country.
Guinea is the world’s leading producer of bauxite.