26 July, 2013IndustriALL Global Union intervened in support of its Bosnia-Herzegovina affiliate in the city of Lukavac, as coke-chemicals company GIKIL fails to pay wages and attacks the union.
The Ispat Group, owned by Pramod Mittal, has a record of social destruction in several countries. Its actions in Nigeria, Libya and Bulgaria over the last five years illustrate a total institutional disregard for the company’s employees and their communities, as well as for the law and the national economies in which they operate. The record includes lengthy pay arrears of up to seven months, leading to numerous worker suicides. The company is also known for cannibalising equipment and exporting it.
The Ispat Group’s subsidiary Global Infrastructure Holdings Ltd has an unscrupulous history in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The company is the minority owner in the coke-chemicals enterprise Global Ispat Koksana Inustrija Lukavac (GIKIL) in the northern city of Lukavac. The enterprise sells coke, a vital element in the steel making process, throughout Central Europe, Turkey and India.
Although the local Canton of Tuzla owns the majority 67 per cent stake, it is Global Infrastructure Holdings that manages the plant. In Lukavac the company stays true to form and repeatedly shows total disregard for the law and for the 1,000 workers at the enterprise.
Repeated failure to pay wages on time have put workers in an impossible position throughout the ten years of the GIKIL operations, especially in light of the unilateral management decision to slash wages to below the minimum wage.
Now GIKIL management has escalated its intimidation of the local Independent trade union of chemistry and non-metals workers of the FBIH, an IndustriALL Global Union affiliate. On 21 June management wrote to 60 members of the senior staff in Lukavac strongly urging them to quit the union and set an example to the rest of the workforce to quit also.
The immediate reason for increasing the squeeze on workers at GIKIL is the 180 million KM (92 million euros) company debt. This artificial debt however was created through highly dubious business dealings by GIKIL, purchasing coal at an inflated price for a prolonged period from another subsidiary of the same holding company, Stenkom owned by Global Infrastructure Holdings.
IndustriALL is taking the case to local and national government in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
In writing to GIKIL Managing Director Mr Kumar Nath, IndustriALL General Secretary Jyrki Raina confirmed:
We stand in firm support of our affiliated Independent trade union of chemistry and non-metals workers of FBIH, under the leadership of President Kata Iveljic, and expect swift action on the part of your management to enter into good faith social dialogue with your union partner, settle the abusive practice of non-payment of salary, reverse this pressure on union members to leave the union, and to find a business solution that will fix the artificial financial debt created through fraudulent dealings with STENKOM.