Translated By: Mohamed Hassan
We are holding this press conference that was preceded by the extra ordinary congress of ETUF due to the current circumstances that Egypt faces and have an effect on the working class.
We are about to run the referendum for the constitution without the article related to workers and peasants …. Every day we also witness continuous and on going protests from workers in many sectors for instance Iron & Steal and Spinning & Textile in addition to other sectors.
In ETUF though we are working day and night and expressing our readiness to cooperate with any side that wishes to coordinate with us for social dialogue for the good of workers and to support the road map to achieve stability at work, we are surprised that we receive stabs from the back from authorities and people who we thought that they repented and began to deal with their responsibilities for the good of people and the country and rid themselves of the suspicious looking organizations that they support and assist secretly and openly to dissolve the Egyptian trade union movement at a time that requires more unity to protect our workers, production and the goals of our revolution….. ETUF restored its role in all sectors and became the legitimate shelter and lawyer for more than 25 million workers in spite of the appearance of some parasites that are supported by prominent individuals to cause a state of frustration, misery and chaos for a certain purpose.
At the same time in ETUF we support road map drawn by the armed forces to lead Egypt to a safe side , we also support our brave army and national police force in their fight against terrorism we also support whoever favors stability we continue strengthening the relations with our grass roots since our congress held in 10- 10- 2013 we are paying some visits to factories and companies in Cairo and other governorates such as Gharbia, Suez, Port Said, and the factories of spinning and textile in Mahala and Helwan to deal closely with the workers problems and to change their point of view of ETUF from just decision maker to supporter of workers to get their legitimate rights and participate with the labour partners in drafting labour systems in the country. All of a sudden we are surprised to find some dishonest people appear in news papers and try their best to show hostility against ETUF in spite of changing its leadership and struggling in all fields those people attack, defame and abort our efforts to defend workers rights more over , they launch false charges against us to pursuit their old attempts to dissolve ETUF for the good of independent unions and to implement an internal and external plot, sometimes they threaten that they will report t the general prosecutor about old violations that our new board is free from or they made random statements to defame and distrust our trade union work nationally and internationally… hence we are holding this press conference to confirm to the public opinion the following:
1) we confirm our objection the cancellation the representation of 50% workers and peasants from the constitution, it is considered according to our point of view a crime committed against workers and peasants it isn’t acceptable after two revolutions the new constitution ignores the rights of 70% of the Egyptian people. We agree that there were some violation in the regulation of representation in the past but it was the responsibility of the government. Therefore, it was necessary for us as we represent 6 million workers and defend the rights of other 25 million to withdraw from the constitution committee as a respect for our workers and peasants and as a protest on the cancellation of one of the gains of July 1952 revolution. In spite of our objection we call all workers and peasants to vote in favour of the constitution as we are voting for a road map that we are supporting and as a support of our brave armed forces…. At the same time we ask the president this fair judge to interfere to bring back this ratio in a form of a law or a decree.
2) We confirm that we are going through a very hard period and we need extreme effort to deal with labour crisis that emerged few years ago and the government is responding negatively against these crisis since the revolution up till now what led to strikes and sets in that could stop production in many sectors.
3) The last period of time witnessed many sets in in Mahalla, Samanood, Asfour crystal co. and iron& steel co. we confirmed our solidarity with the workers claims and won’t give up till they get their rights. ETUF president authorized the president of the general trade Union of workers in Engineering, Metal and Electric industries to join the workers in iron&steel company in their set in to confirm getting their claims.
4) We confirm that the textile industry sector is collapsing due to the wrong policies of privatization of the ex government in addition to the old equipment, lack of investment and development that had a negative impact on the companies … there are other sectors that were affected by the ignoring policy one of them is the heavy industry sector that went into a competition with private sector as a result the factories were about to close.
5) We refuse the tranquility policy we are in need of an organized plan to save the Egyptian industry from downfall . the most prominent problems now are weak production and wages crisis that we are suffering from monthly to the extend that the workers are begging their monthly pay in Textile sector … We are also concerned about restoring the companies that were sentenced by law to re open and resume their activities and they are 4000 factories and to consider the fired workers files … the bonus of health service workers and the files of land reclamation companies.
6) Once again we declare our solidarity with the demands of Iron & Steel workers to get collective bonus that were stated in the financial year 2012-2013 and providing coal which is essential to operate the factories with full power and modernizing production lines to stand the inward and outward competition in addition to strict censorship and raising the fines on flooding to maintain this industry and obtain iron and steel workers rights who are very skilled and efficient they would like to work and get their wages and bonus out of abundant and high quality production these can’t be accomplished without modernizing the factory to work with its full capacity.
7) We believe that the trade union legislations need a radical change especially the labour code no. 12 for the year 2003 that doesn’t achieve equilibrium among the three partners the government, employers and workers, we have visions about health and insurance legislations what needs holding social dialogue sessions among the three partners to reach a definite agreement that will be discussed in the newly elected parliament hoping that the government won’t repeat the previous mistakes when they stated the minimum wages scales to be 1200 Egyptian pounds that is considered a catastrophe and doesn’t ensure decent life . This scale was random with no study or dialogue. We would like to hint to the meeting between Dr. Ashraf el Arabi the minister of planning and Mr. Abdel fatah Ibrahim ETUF president on 5- 12- 2013 in cabinet headquarter and they discussed the issues related to work and labour in Egypt , the minister informed ETUF president that the minimum wages scale will be issued by the end of December this year and will be preceded by a tripartite meeting to state a minimum wages scale.
8) We clarify the fact that the wages system in Egypt needs to be re considered thoroughly. Workers can’t meet the high cost of living with their monthly pay therefore, we are working hard to improve the workers wages scales by increasing investments in companies accordingly we provide self finance that was independent from the government.
9) We would like to confirm that the trade union pluralism file not the trade union freedom is the most prominent there are supporters who call for diversity they even fight to empower this law which is very dangerous on national security as it will lead tot the breaking up of workers and plurality of trade union committees in the factory what will abort negotiation and production as well.
10) We strongly welcomed the decision to form a consular council among the three labour partners in Egypt to be a new phase to solve labour disputes quietly and fast away from sets in and strikes that lead to suspending production, doing so we will start a new era of cooperation among the work partners.
11) We confirm the close relation with federation of industries and commercial champers being one of the three partners we will keep dialogue with them for the good of workers and labour this is the dialogue we seek and all international conventions support for the good of work and production.
12) We follow the Candidacy to the post of director general of Arab Labour Organization, being a member in this organization as we are the biggest trade union organization in Egypt, we will announce our candidate in due time according to the interest of Arab and Egyptian workers this will be done in coordination with ICATU.
13) We confirm that ETUF is exerting great effort to restore its leading role on Arab and international levels in collaboration with ICATU, WFTU and OATUU.
14) Finally we appeal and hope that those who accuse and attack the legitimate workers federation to stop and behave as officials not as ex leaders in independent unions and ITUC the patron that seeks breaking up the Egyptian and Arab trade union movement.