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16 July, 2014United Workers Union of Liberia (Uwul) intends to make more resources available for organizing and recruiting workers in new and ununionized workplaces.
The initiative is just one of a series of plans devised during a three-day workshop on collective bargaining organized by IndustriALL Global Union. The workshop, held in Liberia’s city of Gbarnga in Bong County, took place in early July 2014 and included participants from Uwul and five locals.
IndustriALL affiliate, Uwul, plans to revise its policy of splitting subscriptions equally between the local and the national union. By giving the national union a larger share, more resources will be available to recruit workers.
Changes also need to be made to the payment of subscriptions at new workplaces. The current practice is that a new local only starts to pay subscriptions to the union once a collective bargaining agreement has been signed with management. This process can sometimes take as long as two years.
At the workshop, Fabian Nkomo, IndustriALL’s Sub Saharan African regional secretary, said, "Uwul has the potential to build itself and it can raise resources from within to fund the organising initiative without needing outside support.”
Uwul believes it will adopt progressive resolutions and changes to their policies at their next convention planned for later in 2014.