Delegation to Iraqi Kurdistan
Report of a trade union and Labour Friends of Iraq delegation (31 March to 9 April 2006) by Sue Rogers, Chair of the TUC Iraq Solidarity Committee
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Book Celebrates Determined Comrades Fighting for Free Iraqi Trade Unions
7 August 2006
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Book Celebrates Determined Comrades Fighting for Free Iraqi Trade Unions
“Hadi Never Died: Hadi Saleh and the Iraqi Trade Union Movement” is a recommended book just released about the continuing fight to establish free and democratic trade unions in Iraq. Written by Abdullah Muhsin and Alan Johnson, and published by UK’s Trades Union Congress, all proceeds of the book benefit Iraqi trade unions.
Hadi Saleh might best exemplify the decades-long fight for open and free trade unions inside Iraq. The country was once moderately tolerant of such unions, which made it an economic and social model for the Middle East. Hadi Saleh, then a leader in the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU), was strangled to death with electrical wire in his home after being tortured on 4 January 2005 by assassins aligned with the Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein. He was 58.
In 1969, Hadi Saleh was sentenced to death during the early years of a repressive regime for engaging in activities for free and independent trade unions. He was imprisoned for five years and then fled, taking exile in Sweden. At the height of the invasion in spring 2003 which toppled Saddam Hussein, he returned to Iraq to continue the fight for legitimate trade unions.
At the time of his death, he was the International Secretary of the IFTU, now called the Iraqi Workers’ Federation (IWF).
Hadi Saleh has not been the only trade union advocate since commencement of the Iraqi occupation to meet his death for trade union activity. In 18 February 2005, Ali Hassan Abd of the Oil & Gas Workers’ Union was shot and killed while walking home with his children. Less that a week later, Ahmed Adris Abas of the Transport & Communications Workers’ Union was gunned down in Martyrs’ Square in Baghdad.
On 25 January 2006, Alaa Issa Khalaf of the Mechanics’’ trade union of the General federation of Iraqi Workers was assassinated and in late April of this year, Thabet Hussein of the General Union for Health Sector Workers was murdered. In June, Shukry Al Shakhly, a founder of the IFTU, was also murdered.
Others have been kidnapped, or have been victims of senseless killings that occur every day now in Iraq.
Author and IWF liaison Abdullah Muhsin voiced the beliefs of Hadi Saleh at the recent launch of the book: “Free and independent unions will play an important role in making sure investment provides quality jobs and decent public services.
“But unions are also important in forming Iraq’s democratic future and national identity,” he added. “Our independence makes us a home to all Iraqis irrespective of gender, ethnicity, and religion. Unions are an antidote to the sectarian poisons of extremism in Iraq.”
“Hadi Never Died: Hadi Saleh and the Iraqi Trade Union Movement” can be ordered for ₤10 at http://www.tuc.org.uk/publications, or by e-mailing media@tuc.org.uk, or calling +44 20 7467 1294.
Ensure that Memory of Hadi Saleh Endures
Tribune 28 July 2006.
Abdullah Muhsin says that trade unions can be the bulwark of a democratic and inclusive Iraq, but they need international support.
In January last year, Hadi Saleh, international secretary of the Iraqi Federation of Trade Union was tortured and murdered in his own home by assassin loyal to Saddam Hussein. The British TUC recently published a history of Iraqi trade unions to commemorate Hadi’s brave fight for the working people of Iraq and raise funds for its young trade union movement.
Unions in Iraq, united in the Iraqi workers Federation (IWF), seek economic growth and equality jobs in a democratic society rooted in human rights. As the main secular force in Iraqi society. We are crucial to making this happen, but we need the help of trade unionists around the world.
Many of us were force into exiled during Saddam’s reign returned, as Hadi did, when the dictator fell, in order to form free trade unions. Independent unions were suppressed for four decades under Saddam’s brutal regime and because his “ yellow unions” were an arm of his terror machine, the very word “union” evokes suspicion among some Iraqi workers.
This culture of fear is being dismantled through our work with many global unions but it is not over. Hadi’s murder sparked a wave of assassinations.
Terrorists who wanted to prevent civil society from functioning also target workers in key areas, such as teachers who are spreading the values of human rights and women’s equality.
Ali Hassan Abd of the Oil and Gas Workers Union was shot in front of his children in February 2005. Ahmed Adris Abass of the Transport and Communication Workers Union was shot dead in Martyr Square in Baghdad. Talib Khdim a leading IWF official was attacked and kidnapped, as was saady Edan, the head of our Mosul branch. In May this year Thabit Ali of the Health Sector was murdered in Baghdad.
Last month Shukry Al Shakhly a founder member of the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions, was murdered in Baghdad, 85 workers were kidnapped from Al Nasa complex. In Taji seven workers were executed. At least 10 members of the Union of Mechanics, Printing and Metalworkers were killed. A few weeks ago, as suicide bomber killed Hassen Nassar, a leader of the Agricultural and Foodstuff Workers Union.
Terrorism is not the only attack Iraq unions face. The new Iraqi Government has demonstrated that it will not free unions from the suppression they faced under Saddam. It refuses to lift his ban on public sector or adopt a labour code that conforms to the International Labour Organisation core conventions.
Last year the Government introduced powers to exercise detailed control of unions and freeze our meagre assets. The TUC has led global protest against these restrictions and the Government has signalled a review, but pressure must be maintained.
Iraq’s needs jobs, Iraq’s economy was pulverised by Saddam’s wars, bled by unjust United Nations sanctions and further devastated by the invasion, looting and rampant corrupation. Iraq’s national economy needs emergency investment and widespread reconstruction, not privatization. And Iraq’s economy must be diversify, as more than 95 per cent of the country’s income derives from oil, which will not last forever.
We are fighting to strengthen the capacity of unions so that workers are not left on the sidelines as new elites restructure the national economy on neo-liberal lines. Without economic growth twined with social justice, democracy will not take root.
Iraqi unions can also be one of the most important independent centres in the formation of our democratic future. The unions can be a home to all Iraqis, irrespective of gender, ethnicity and religion. They can help promote social inclusion, prosperity and citizenship. Unions are the antidote to the sectarian poisons of extremism in iraq.
Hadi gave his life to the Iraq trade union movement. Please support our efforts in his memory.
Hadi Never Died: Hadi Saleh and the Iraqi trade Union Movement by Abdullah Muhsin and Alan Johnson is available from www.tuc.org.uk/publications or 020 7467 1294, for £10 (bulk discounts). Profits will go to the TUC Aid for Iraq Appeal.