Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) World Peace Forum
26 June 2006 - Vancouver, Canada
Sisters and Brothers,
Dear Friends and comrades of the World Peace Forum,
1. Thank you very much for inviting the GFIW/IWF to Vancouver to this Canadian Labour Congress World Peace Forum. It is great honour. The IWF wholeheartedly appreciates this solidarity gesture.
2. I would like to share with you some thoughts concerning Iraq and its organised labour movement.
3. The risks of Iraq descending into civil war are still real. Iraq is battling for its national unity, its sovereignty and integrity. And is fighting to consolidate its representative parliamentary polity and a way to create a federal Iraq where the people of Iraqi Kurdistan may enjoy federal autonomy, peace and democracy.
4. But in this Iraqis are hindered by the legacy of 4 long decades of Saddam’s fascist-type dictatorship, by the current onslaught of terrorists, and by the impact of the occupation and its disastrous policies.
5. Heinous crimes are committed against the people of Iraq by religious fundamentalists and extreme nationalists. Their scheme quite simple though brutal, is to push our country into sectarian civil war and thus destroy Iraq and any chance of building on the social and political progress Iraqis have gained since the fall of Saddam’s regime, limited though it is.
6. The transitional phase of Iraq’s polity remains fragile and extremely dangerous and requires careful handling by Iraq’s sovereign legislative body and its accountable executive. Any unwise move by one of the two mentioned agencies could plunge the country in unforeseen danger.
7. Victory in this battle against these religious fundamentalist and extreme nationalist forces is fundamental for achieving a unified, democratic and federal Iraq of social justice and respect for human rights.
8. Hence Iraq’s incumbent representative government must exert utmost effort to ensure victory and thus consolidate national unity. It should, therefore have to tackle urgently five concerns. They are significantly important for Iraq’s future political stability and its pluralistic development. These concerns are intimately connected, and they are:
• Security;
• Ending the presence of foreign military forces and restoring Iraq’s full national sovereignty by eliminating the consequences of the occupation;
• Eradicating the long shadow of Saddam’s fascist-type dictatorship;
• Rebuilding Iraq’s pulverised economy, reducing high unemployment and improving the equality of lives of ordinary working people (Growing Economy);
• Resolving Iraq’s national identity.
9. Security:
10. The short history of our young trade union federation has been bloody one. The IWF, alongside the majority of Iraqis, has democratically and consciously but critically embraced the UN-sanctioned political process under resolution UN [1546]. The alternative to that is outright civil war, carnage and the break-up of Iraq. Iraqis do not want this, nor do we.
11. As a consequence of taking this stand our federation has endured kidnapping and murder in cold blood.
12. Hadi Saleh, our late international secretary paid the ultimate price for his commitment to trade union rights. He was tragically assassinated after being brutally tortured by Saddam’s thugs in his home January 2005. His assassination marked new waves of murders and kidnapping against Iraqi organised labour. Ali Hassan Abd of the Oil and Gas Workers' Union was shot and killed in front of his children while returning home in Baghdad February 2005. Ahmed Adris Abas of the Transport and Communication Workers’ Union was shot dead in Martyr's square in central Baghdad while on trade union duty a few weeks later. Talib Khadim, a leading official of our federation was attacked and kidnapped, as was Saady Edan, the head of our federation’s Mosul branch.
13. Assassins tried unsuccessfully on several occasions to kill the President of our federation’s Kirkuk branch. Threats against our officials continued throughout. At least ten members of the Union of Mechanics, Printing and Metalworkers have been killed. A few weeks ago a suicide bomber killed a key union leader in the Agricultural and Foodstuff Workers’ Union in Baghdad. These forces are committing genocide against ordinary working people.
14. The international labour movement has risen with one voice to condemn the killing of Iraqi trade unionists and to extend the hand of solidarity to our federation. Please see the ICFTU survey, June 2006 on trade union rights violations in the Middle East in which Iraq and one neighbouring country lead the chart.
15. The IWF has repeatedly argued that security situation must be tackled immediately. And has said that political and economic measures must go hand in hand with military measures. Resorting to military force alone will inflame and aggravate the situation further. The blatant violations of the US military forces in Haditha and other places is a vivid example of this and highlights the need to bring an end to the occupation and remove the foreign military presence from our country, Iraq.
16. The IWF has called on the Iraqi government to develop its own armed forces that are based on national unity. These forces must beholden to no political party or individuals but loyal only to Iraq’s constitution, securing Iraq’s territorial integrity, protecting civilians and maintaining law and order.
17. Bu, the biggest internal obstacle to build such security forces is the growth of sectarianism and sectarian conflict fuelled by some Iraqi political forces that are employing sectarian-ethnic polarisation and run their militias as an alternative in order to seize power and thus secure commanding positions within government. This was evident during the December 2005election.
18. The security situation was further worsened by the openly advertised policies of the foreign occupiers who resorted to an ethnic categorisation of our society. It is a disastrous policy that brought Iraqis further bloodshed and misery. The occupation must end.
19. End the occupation:
20. Foreign military presence constitutes a violation of national sovereignty. The Iraqi government’s surrender to external economic pressures and to the diktat of international financial institutions is one facet of that violation. The occupation must be brought to an end now.
21. Our federation opposed the action of the transitional government of Al-Jafaari in June 2005, who acted without the support of Iraqi Parliament when it called on the UN to renew the mandate of the occupation forces in Iraq.
22. To achieve this end, the IWF supports and welcomes the reconvening of the Accord Conference Planned for the next few weeks in Baghdad endorsed and supported by the Arab League. The conference seeks to bring different Iraqi political and social forces to share common aims of one united, federal and democratic Iraq. The conference will forge a compromise between different Iraqi communities, which is essential for the restoration of Iraq’s national sovereignty and thus a key means to end the occupation.
23. The IWF has called on the government to work for the removal of foreign forces by creating the material, political and security fundamentals to end the occupation now and eradicate Saddam’s long nightmare.
24. Eradicating Saddam’s legacy:
25. Building a genuine democracy depends not only on the role of the state - although it’s fundamentally essential - but also on the active participation of civil society.
26. Our federation strongly believes that it is impossible to foresee the creation of open and democratic Iraq without allowing its organised labour movement to operate freely and independently from the influence of the state and political parties.
27. But how can our movement operate freely when the shadow of Saddam’s 1987 anti-union laws is still hanging over our heads and prohibits workers in the public sector from joining unions or forming their own unions.
28. Many Iraqi workers remain suspicious of the very term 'union', because of the repression they endured at the hands of Saddam's 'yellow unions' which was part of the state machine of terror. During Saddam’s wars of aggression, his yellow unions were used as an intelligence agency that spied on workers and acted as a recruiting centre to send Iraqi working people to the battle front to be killed during the Iran-Iraq War. This culture of fear that was associated with Saddam’s unions must be dismantled.
29. To reverse and remedy this cultural deficit, our federation is working with many global unions on several cultural and training projects. Unison, the largest British public service union is organizing a serious of training courses for Iraqi/Kurdish workers to promote the basic tenets of trade unionism and to help eradicate Saddam’s tyrannical culture.
30. Instead of giving support to the new unions the new Iraqi government not only maintained Saddam’s anti-union laws - reluctant to adopt a labour code that adheres to ILO core conventions - but also issued an anti-union Order 8750 to curtail and hinder our development.
31. In August 2005 the government of the former PM Al-Jaafari issued its notorious anti-union order 8750 authorising the state to virtually take over the trade union movement. This order enabled the government to exercise detailed control of the organised trade union movement by employing a well-rehearsed anti-union legislation borrowed from Thatcherism and Reaganism.
32. The Minister of Transport recently attacked the port workers in Basra and closed their office. Thanks to the international solidarity campaign of the ITF, the Iraqi port workers won their rights to independent trade unionism.
33. A protest movement has been developing against this order and for wider trade union rights. This workers’ movement is critically essential for the future development of democracy in Iraq. It needs your solidarity and support.
34. Our federation is encouraged by the active solidarity work of the ICFTU and the TUC. The TUC has led a world-wide protest against Order 8750 (following the request of the GFIW).
35. Growing Economy:
36. Iraq’s economy was pulverized by Saddam’s wars, bled by the unjust UN sanctions after the Saddam disastrous invasion of the brotherly state of Kuwait and further devastated by the 2003 invasion and occupation and its rampant corruption.
37. Iraq’s national economy is crying for emergency investment and reconstruction of all its sectors. But national assets must remain publicly owned. Stop privatization policies. Instead Iraqi industries must be rehabilitated.
38. Iraq’s economy must be diversified, as over 95% of Iraq’s income currently derives from oil. This must change as oil will not last forever
39. Our federation is fighting to strengthen the organization capacity of democratic and independent unions in Iraq so workers are not left on the sidelines, watching passively as new elites restructure the national economy in line with fashionable neo-conservative, liberal trends, which threaten regulation, participation and equality’. It is the IWF, which has ensured Iraqi workers have not been watching from the sidelines.
40. Without a growing economy of social justice democracy will not take root in Iraq. When collective social provision and the public service ethic is entirely squeezed out by the dictates of unregulated markets - then democracy itself withers on the vine.
41. Trade unions are democracy’s egalitarian insurance policy against the self-defeating triumph of egoism (the market). Unions are the embodiment of a powerful idea: that equality and freedom advance best when they advance together. If we are engaged in a global battle of ideas then it is the idea of freedom for all that is capable of winning against the extremists.
42. When democracies look after unions, unions look after democracies. Gaining tangible benefits from democratic politics, trade unions have been great defenders of democratic politics.
43. Identity:
44. The Iraqi unions can be one of the most important independent centres of identity, opinion and resource in the formation, development and consolidation of our democratic future and Iraq’s national identity, that is a home to all Iraqis irrespective of their ethnicity and religion. And as Shia and Sunni and Turkoman and Assyrian Christian and Kurds unite in some spheres of their lives, then the meaning of their distinct historic identities can be transformed into workers, citizens, Iraqis. This is for two reasons: unions promote social inclusion and prosperity; unions promote social unity and citizenship.
45. Unions are the engines that propel the economy. A prosperous and healthy economy encourages social and political stability and helps maintain a strong sense of community. Unions are the glue that binds together disparate identities and traditions on the basis of social justice, democracy and human rights. Trade unions are playing a major role in bringing sectarian combatants to the same table, to share dreams of a better life for our children, dignity at work, a fair share of prosperity and decent wages. Unions are great antidote against the sectarian poisons of extremism in Iraq.
46. I believe that the free trade unions in Iraq can play a historic role to help cement this identity which is a key recovery factor of achieving full national sovereignty.
Thank you
Abdullah Muhsin
IWF
26 June Vancouver