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<img height="39" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100"/>
ICEM’s largest affiliate in Africa, South Africa’s National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), last week welcomed the release of the Presidential Safety Audit by the Department of Minerals and Energy. As reported by the ICEM (click <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/2871-South-African-Parliament-Passes-Mine-Safety-Reform;-Year-long-Safety-Audit-Still-Held-up " type="internal">here</a>) there had been a significant delay in the publication of the report. 
 
The NUM criticized the industry for using the report to misrepresent conditions as acceptable. A shocking figure to emerge from the report was that 100 cases against mine bosses have been allowed to collect in the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), with no progress. This alarming evidence of justice being blocked for those responsible for deaths of miners has angered the NUM. 

<img height="128" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0610NUMFransBaleni1.jpg" width="90"/>
NUM General Secretary Frans Baleni
“This is very worrying that the NPA can allow criminality to take place without any proper action,” said NUM General Secretary Frans Baleni. “It is worrying that in cases where action has taken place, companies have been fined between R2,500 (US$260) to R5,000 (US$520) for negligently claiming the life of mineworkers.” 
 
The audits were conducted in 355 mines across the country, under 12 categories. Gold and coal mines were the safest at 70%, followed by platinum and diamond mines at 67% and 66%, respectively. 
 
The long-awaited report describes worrying trends, including poor hazard identification and risk assessment processes, slow reporting of accidents, failure to submit occupational hygiene returns and others. 

<img height="105" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0810Senzeni3.jpg" width="90"/>
NUM & ICEM President, Senzeni Zokwana
The audits were ordered by former President Thabo Mbeki after 3,200 workers were trapped deep underground at gold producer Harmony Gold's Elandsrand mine in October 2007, when a falling pipe damaged mine shaft infrastructure. Miraculously, all 3,200 miners were rescued after some 38 hours. 
 
Senzeni Zokwana, NUM President and also President of the ICEM, said the union has zero tolerance for mine fatalities. "No condition should justify why a worker should lose a life."

Safety Audit Release in South Africa Gives Cause for Concern

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The Council of Finnish Industrial Unions (TP) is calling for higher cooperation with employers and business groups as the protocol to lessen the sting of the current economic crisis. The group of 14 trade unions last week called on Finnish business and social partners to join the unions in a set of talks aimed at ensuring a stable labour market and income maintenance so purchasing power does not drop. 
 
The Council has set a date of 25 February for an initial meeting with industrial and service sector employers’ groups to discuss the means in finding common ground on employment strategies and domestic market improvements. Several European Works Councils (EWCs) of leading Finland companies came out after the unions’ call and endorsed strengthened cooperation between TP and business. 

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The unions are eager to reach an accord in order to avert mass job losses, to strengthen and enhance company competitiveness, and to continue strong domestic demand for goods and services. Such an agreement, which would cover 90% of Finland’s two million wage earners, would be the socially conscious approach to avoid mass redundancies that, TP claims, are not brought on by lack of Finnish competitiveness, but rather by a deep crisis that has hit hard on production and demand. 
 
“Under these circumstances, freezing wages, curbing the growth of purchasing power, or weakening other terms of employment are not the right solutions” to current economic problems, said TP in a statement. TP is calling for a social accord that would be binding on the unions, labour market confederations, central employer associations, and the Finnish public sector. 
 
Trade unions enjoined to TP include Paperiliitto, Kemianliitto, Finnish Electrical Workers’ Union, Toimihenkilöunioni (TU), or the Salaried Employees’ Union, Finnish Media Union, Finnish Metalworkers Union (Metalli), Wood and Allied Workers’ Union, Construction Trade Union, Finnish Foodstuff Workers’ Union, Association of Business School Graduates (SEFE), Association of Graduate Engineers (TEK), Union of Professional Engineers UIL, and the Union of Machine Supervisors.

Finnish Council of Trade Unions Call for Framework Employer Agreement to Offset Economic Crisis

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A wage arrears dispute at a Argentina pulp and paper mill was resolved, though only by earnest intervention by Buenos Aires Minister of Work Oscar Cuartango 11 days ago. Some 430 workers now will get back wages in a guaranteed payment plan. 
 
Their salaries have been owed them since December and January when family-run Massuh SA halted its payroll at the Quilmes pulp and paper mill near Buenos Aires. 
<img height="69" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Argentina.png" width="150"/>
The ICEM cited the dispute last month, and sent a protest letter to the company, with copies to both the federal and state Work ministers. ICEM Argentina affiliate Federation of Workers’ of Paper, Carton, and Chemical (FOEIPCyQ) Unions championed this grievous breach of fair treatment and received scores of support letters from ICEM affiliates worldwide. Massuh SA is owned by the interconnected Massuh and Petrocchi families of Argentina, which also has major holdings in another Argentina paper enterprise, Fibra Papelera. 
 
Massuh SA, in April 2008, sold a paper converting plant in San Luis to Ledesma, a Blaquier family operation, and earlier had spun a brown paper plant in San Justo off to Fibra Papelera. Because of the recession in finished paper production, Massuh acquired a US$40 million loan in mid-2008, a loan in which the lending institution granted an 18-month grace period before payments are due. 
 
FOEIPCyQ said in a statement to the ICEM: “We extend our deep gratefulness to the many unions who heard the ICEM’s call for assistance and support for our working companions of the Massuh company. This is now a triumph of the workers because it was their iron will which would not allow their rights to be taken from them.”

Argentina Paperworkers at Massuh SA Receive Assurances of Pay

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The Solidarity Support Organisation of the Central Labour Organisation of Finland (SASK) is an important partner of many Global Union Federations (GUFs) in joint work in Africa, Latin America and the Asia Pacific Regions. But until now, it has not undertaken support work with a GUF in the Middle East. 
 
This may be about to change. In a first such effort, SASK organised a three-day set of workshops in Amman, Jordan. The sessions ran from 29 September to 1 October, and were aimed at sharing information and experiences with the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and the GUFs. 
 
The ICEM’s Jim Catterson represented the Geneva-based GUF during the discussions, which brought together representatives from SASK, the ITUC, and six GUFs. SASK has seen the main reason for its absence in the region as a lack of good project proposals being tabled before them. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0910.amman-sask.jpg" width="362" height="194"/>
Conference participants, outside the office of the General Union of Textile and Garment Workers in Jordan. 
After a brief formal opening session, ITUC representatives gave an up-to-date report on the trade union movement throughout the Arab World. This was followed by an overview from SASK on its global activities, methods of work and priorities regarding both work and information sharing with other Solidarity Support Organisations and the global union movement. 
 
Each GUF was then given time to describe its own activities in the region, developments in respective sectors, and GUF priorities for future work in the region. Here, Catterson emphasized that ICEM is still in a building stage in the Middle East/North Africa (MENA) Region, and a major overall priority is to integrate the union work. As well, a main priority is to integrate MENA affiliates into the global work and activities of the ICEM. 
 
Clearly, privatisation of industrial enterprises, as well as gaining greater access to MNC investment has led to new challenges for the trade unions throughout the region, Catterson said. Unions also need assistance to organise workers in the new enterprises. Trade unions delegates attending from the region expressed their wish to have more information, as well as advice on how to benefit from the range of "international instruments," including ILO Conventions, OECD Guidelines, the Global Compact, and Global Framework Agreements. 

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Delegates receive a briefing in the local ITLGWU-affiliated union office inside a QIZ 
Catterson described in detail the joint work the ICEM is doing with the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) in bringing together oil and gas workers’ unions with port and transport unions that are involved in energy transportation in Iraq. 
 
Further sessions included a detailed focus on the issue of Migrant Labour in the region and in Jordan in particular, which saw extensive presentations from International Textile, Garment, Leather Workers’ Federation (ITGLWF) and the ILO Better Work programme. This latter project focuses on the garment industry and after an initial program in Cambodia, has expanded to a number of other countries including Jordan. 
 
Jordan has a significant garment manufacturing industry with production geared on exports almost totally to the US. The industry is principally located in special export processing zones known as Qualified Industrial Zones (QIZs). Here, working and living conditions are truly appalling, with the overwhelmingly the number of workers foreign migrant workers. The ITGLWF Jordanian affiliate described the difficulties they face in organising workers in such conditions. Often, such workers distrust trade unions from experiences in their own countries and few speak Arabic. As well, access to either workplaces or living accommodations is tightly controlled by employers who often prevented union organisers from gaining access. However, ITGLWF had, in many instances, overcome such obstacles and continue to organise migrant workers in the industry. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ITGLWF100.jpg" width="100" height="100"/><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ITUC100.jpg" width="100" height="95"/><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ITF.jpg" width="95" height="95"/>
Participants were able to see an example of these successes with a visit to a factory making jeans for the US market. The factory was in one such QIZ in an area north of Amman. The union has an office, staffed by multi-lingual organisers, with the office displaying the flags of nations in which migrant workers hail from. The organizers speak such diverse languages as Chinese, Urdu, Tamal, and Arabic. 
 
Workshop participants received an initial briefing by union officials and organizers in the union office, as well as a tour of a small but well-equipped medical clinic that serves workers and their families. The clinic provides free medical treatment, dental care, and diagnostics. 
 
It was established with support of the Asia and Pacific Regional Organisation (TWARO) of ITGLWF, along with the GUF’s Japanese affiliates. It stands as a facility that any union would be proud to have. 
 
Management at one of the textile factories, employing around 1,500 workers, mainly from the Indian sub-continent, then joined the discussions for a question and answer session. Most of the workforce was organised by the union and a reasonable relationship had been built between union and management. 
 
ICEM will be in discussions with SASK in the future with a view toward developing joint programmes and providing solidarity and assistance to affiliated unions throughout the MENA Region.

ICEM Joins SASK of Finland, Others in Union-Building Workshops in Middle East

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During an evaluation mission to Colombian cities Bogota and Medellin, representatives of the ICEM and of 2 Swedish ICEM affiliates (IFMetall and Pappers) were able to see first hand that the Swedish-funded ICEM project on Social Dialogue in Colombia is delivering excellent results. Throughout the two days of meetings and visits, all ICEM affiliates in Colombia unanimously praised the many different efforts and activities of the project. Participating ICEM affiliates are Sintracarbon (mining), Sintraquim (chemical, pharmaceutical), Sintracarcol (paper), Sintraelecol and Fenaltec (electricity) and Sintravidricol (glass, materials). New ICEM affiliate USO is to join the project’s activities shortly. 
 
Efficiently run by project coordinator Carlos Bustos, in close cooperation with the members of the ICEM Colombia Committee (i.e. the ICEM affiliates), the project’s main aim is to encourage more and better social dialogue between ICEM affiliated trade unions and (mainly multinational) companies in Colombia. And it seems to be succeeding quite well in this, looking at the year-long progress in the joint employer-union social dialogue efforts. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0910Carlos.bustos.jpg" width="180" height="146"/>
Carlos Bustos, ICEM Colombia Project Coordinator
A more recent indication of progress made is the fresh interest shown by a number of additional companies to participate in the project, including Drummond, Repsol, Votorantim, Cerromatoso, SCA, Smurfit Kappa, Ross International and Petrobras. The project’s social dialogue activities include joint social dialogue conferences and joint training sessions on specific social dialogue topics. Companies that have been participating in the process for some time include Carbones de Cerrejon (Xstrata, AngloAmerican and BHP Billiton), Linde, Gas Natural, Owens Illinois and Endesa. 
 
Other areas where a great deal of impressive work has been done include the leadership training programmes (which are bringing rank-and-file, as well as both young and female trade unionists into leadership positions) and the discussions on creating a larger industrial union for most, if not all, ICEM sectors in Colombia. Yet another area of work has been around the issue of contract and agency labour (CAL). As in many other places around the globe, CAL is also an enormous problem in Colombia. A number of multinational companies, including from the energy sector, have become almost “shell companies”, outsourcing virtually everything. Working under difficult circumstances in Colombia, unions nevertheless spoke of a number of successes in organising CAL workers. 

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A worker / trade unionist at Ross International telling the story
Commended was also the communication between the project and the ICEM and other ICEM affiliates (including, for example, the USW in the United States), with virtually all Colombian ICEM unions noting positive after an international intervention. The affiliates emphasised the importance, and success, of this international support. One more positive aspect highlighted by almost all was the work done by the project on HIV/AIDS. 
 
Pointed out by several was also the fact that, since the project began to assist them, the collective membership of the participating unions rose from 1,500 to over 20,000.

ICEM Colombia Social Dialogue Project Doing Well 

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A five-week strike at a BHP-owned manganese mine and smelter by members of the Kimberley branch of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) in South Africa ended 5 October with a satisfactory one-year contract. 
 
The resolve came after global pressure was applied by ICEM mining affiliates, as well as attention given BHP’s bargaining indifference at the recent statutory meeting of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), and at ICEM’s Sub-Sahara Africa Region Meeting in Lagos, Nigeria, on 15 September. 
 
“We were very fortunate to have international pressure and a COSATU focus on this strike,” said NUM Kimberley Regional Coordinator Lucas Phiri. “The arrogance of this company from the mine level to the Johannesburg office was something I have not seen in 12 years inside the NUM.” 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/SouthAfricaCOSATU2.jpg" width="102" height="111"/>
The 920 miners and smelting-plant workers at BHP’s Hozatel Manganese operation in the Northern Cape downed tools on 28 August. Their dispute was not just about wages – South African managers, in fact, were cancelling meetings both at the local level and with NUM national officers – but about parity between black and white miners, and for improved conditions for women in this remote mining region of the Northern Cape. 
 
With 90% of the 920 workers black, the NUM discovered that white workers at Hozatel got better medical assistance benefits, and received a transportation allowance of 2,000 rands per month, while blacks received 440 rands. Many miners live in hostels, but others travel from the village of Kuruman to the Hozatel operation. 
 
Due to outside pressure on BHP, local management finally got serious on addressing issues that caused the strike and called for talks on 5 October. Both sides agreed to an 8% pay increase effective 1 September, with a one-off 4,000 rand payment per worker for the period July-September 2009. A prior agreement expired 1 July, and the agreement reached on 5 October will last until 1 September 2010. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/SouthafricaNUM.gif" width="100" height="103"/>
Another key issue resolved related to NUM’s ability to recruit into membership workers in higher-level classifications. BHP originally demanded a 66% vote, but the resolve reached in early October made that the standard 50% plus one, or a simple majority. 
 
Related to the parity issues, the two sides agreed to establish a separate bilateral forum to address and even out the disproportionate medical and transportation benefits between white and black workers. A deadline of 30 December 2009 has been put on resolving that. 
 
The same deadline holds for dealing with the employment equity between women and men, as well as the company’s draconian policy of not granting maternity leave to women who have less than three years of employment service. 
 
The agreement “was not all that we had hoped for,” stated Phiri, “but we are forever thankful for the outside pressure that moved a management that had before been so stubborn to address workers concerns.” 
 
BHP operates Hozatel under its Middelplaats Manganese subsidiary, an asset it acquired with its partial buy-up of Semancor in the 1980s. The mine and ferrochrome smelting facility had originally been part of AngloAmerican.

Union Pressure Helps End BHP Manganese Strike in South Africa for NUM

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This morning, 500 workers demonstrated infront of the Headquarters of Ceramics company Preiss Daimler, in the Belgian city of Saint-Ghislain. Protesters denounced the loss of 173 jobs following the announcement that the ceramics refractory had bankrupt. Workers losing their jobs were not even paid their salary for the month of September. 
 
Slogans of the angry workers, members of the ICEM affiliated FGTB, included: ‘Press Daimler, Rogue Bosses!’ and ‘Press Daimler, 173 workers on the tiles!’ 

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The ICEM supports the demands from the FGTB, that these workers deserve respect for their skills, and should be offered new prospects for work in their sector. It should not be the workers who are to pay twice for the financial crisis. 
 
The Press Daimler workers call for intervention from politicians and business leaders to save jobs through a take-over of the company.

Belgian Ceramics Workers Protest Job Losses

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After earlier releases in a number of other languages (for more, please consult the ICEM’s Contract and Agency Labour site <a href="http://cal.icem.org/index.php/en/icem-guide-on-cal">here</a>), the ICEM is now releasing the Croatian versions of the “ICEM Guide on Contract and Agency Labour” (CAL) as well as of the shorter and more practical “Negotiators’ Guide on CAL”. The Croatian translations have been made possible through the joint ICEM-IUF South-East European Project on Trade Union Modernisation. 

<img style="WIDTH: 140px; HEIGHT: 80px" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CroatiaFLAG.gif" width="140" height="70" alt=""/>
This CAL guide describes numerous contract, agency and other precarious work situations from around the world - both in developing and developed countries. It contains a number of best practice examples, as well numerous worrying stories, including some of the terrible working conditions that many workers in precarious employment find themselves in. The guide also provides an overview of some of the more recent changes in national and international labour laws and standards, and further deals with combating this phenomenon at company level. 
 
The “Short Guide for Negotiators on How to Deal with Contracting Out, Outsourcing and/or Agency Labour” is an instrument to assist trade unionists at the plant level. It provides practical suggestions on what to do when (or before) the issue comes up.

ICEM releases Croatian versions of its Contract and Agency Labour Guides

On the recent call by the Iraqi government to form a new preparatory committee for the election of the GFIW leadership. 
 
 
The Higher Ministerial Committee overseeing the implementation of Governing Council's decision No.(3) for the year 2004 officially announced recently that nominations are open to establish a national preparatory committee with responsibility to organize and supervise the GFIW leadership election across Iraq. 
 
This government action was done without any prior knowledge or consultation with GFIW despite the government claim that it is organizing this (election) in line with current labour law[ Law 52 of 1987] and the internal rules of the GFIW [GFTU Rules]. 
 
The Executive Committee of the General Federation of Iraqi Workers states that the current move by the High Ministerial Committee completely violates Labour Law number (52) of 1987 and the internal rules of the GFIW [GFTU]. 
 
The High Ministerial Committee overseeing the implementation of Governing Council's decision No. (3) for the year 2004, should have implemented what it had issued before ( reference to the letter of the Ministry of State for Civil Society No c s / 106 On 13 September, which lead to the formation of a national preparatory committee on 2/2008 set up with the task of preparing and supervising workers election. A date for election was set on 22 June 2008 and then on 1 March 2009 but all this was cancelled without any justification by an order ( No 86 on 1March 2009) issued by the Minister of Civil Society. 
 
The GFIW stressed repeatedly that workers have the right to form and join union is and it believes that this is a legitimate democratic practice endorsed by international Labour organization (ILO) standards and guaranteed by article 22 of by the permanent Iraqi constitution. 
 
Convention No. 87 of 1948 of the ILO and Convention No. 8 of 1977, of the Arab labour organization obliges Member States to provide workers with freedom to form trade unions and compel states not to interfere in internal affairs of the unions. 
 
The main aim of organizing workers into trade union is to strengthen industrial relations and improve social and cultural conditions for workers so that they can help in the reconstruction of Iraq. 
 
The GFIW/IFTU while rejecting the current government interference in its internal affairs, Is calling on Iraqi workers to stand up to defend their legitimate rights and is appealing to the wider trade union movement, professional associations and civil society organizations, political parties and members of the Iraqi parliament for support and assistance and for the solidarity support of the international trade union movement in order to put an stop to all government interference. 
 
GFIW Executive 
October 2009

GFIW Statement

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The ICEM received a report over this past weekend from the Federation of Workers’ Councils and Unions (FWCUI) that a workers’ demonstration in Baghdad was fired upon by armed forces. The demonstration and use of armed force occurred on 6 October near the Green Zone in central Baghdad. 
 
The report the ICEM received from the FWCUI said many of the 2,000 protestors were hit with rubber bullets. The ICEM condemns such military action against workers, and calls it one further example why Iraq must enact legitimate labour law and recognise free and independent trade unions. 

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Industrial workers had requested and received a permit from the Baghdad military to hold the demonstration, a protest over pay remunerations since 2008, safety benefits, and to settle cases of workers dismissed from jobs for political reasons under the Saddam regime. 
 
The march on 6 October started at Al Tahreer Square, and crossed Al Jumhoria Bridge towards the Green Zone, where armed forces indiscriminately fired upon and beat demonstrators. Four workers were severely beaten and arrested: Thamir Hameed and Muhammad Khangar from a battery manufacturing industry; Muhammad Khamees from an electrical facility; and Munadhil Attia from the leather manufacturing industry. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0911.iraq.rally.2.JPG" width="287" height="215"/>
The FWCUI declared the attack “an unprecedented act of terror that will not be forgiven,” and called upon authorities to fire the soldiers responsible and to try them criminally. A representative of the Ministries’ Council admitted of an unprovoked armed confrontation and said the council stood ready to issue a formal statement of apology. 
 
The ICEM has two affiliated trade unions that are part of the FWCUI, and the Geneva-based Global Union Federation calls on workers’ organizations everywhere to support the FWCUI in their efforts to bring those responsible for this cowardly attack on workers to justice. 
 
The ICEM also supports FWCUI in its efforts for security and just economic entitlements for workers of its federation.

Iraqi Armed Troops Fire at Peaceful Demonstration in Baghdad

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