The electricity workers union in Basra is organizing a peaceful demonstration in central Baghdad on Saturday 31 July 2010 to protest against the ban introduced by the Minister Hussain al-Shahristani on July 20 that prohibit public sector workers from the right to belong to trade unions organization.

The head of the union in Basra Sister Hashmeya Muhsin said that the demonstration will start at nine o’clock on Saturday morning and will take place in Firdaus Square, central Baghdad. All trade unions were invited to take part in this public demo to defend democracy and to tell the  minister to cancel his notorious order. The ministerial order relied on old anti union legislation introduced by the former dictatorship of Saddam Hussein’s regime.

An organizer of the protest said permission to hold the protest were obtained from the Iraqi security forces.

 GFIW

Statement issued by the General Federation of Iraqi Workers (GFIW) on the move of the Ministry of Electricity against Electricity Workers Union.

The Ministry of Electricity recently moved to ban trade union activities and organization in its institutions and has asked its departments to coordinate with police to close down the offices and to take control of union assets, documents and computers according to the Ministerial Order No 22 244 on 07/20/2010.

Paragraph No 3 of the Ministerial Order says the ministry must “take immediate legal action,” and bring charges against those who “resort to the use or threat of violence aimed at damage to public properties under Articles (2 and 4) of the Terrorism Act No. (13) 2005″.

The arbitrary action taken by the Ministry of Electricity and the measures it used to close down the offices of the unions is unacceptable by the whole Iraqi trade union movement. Iraqi workers insist on the legitimate right of workers in the public sector that employ thousands of workers on permanent and temporary contracts

to join a trade union, as enshrined in the new Iraqi constitution. The GFIW is determined to defend workers interests and rights.

The harmful and demeaning practices exerted by some self-interested individuals claiming to be trade unionists that are using the GFIW name and operating freely at the sites of Ministry. The GFIW believes the Ministry has turned blind eye to this disruptive fact for so long and now instead of taking legal action against those individuals, it has unfortunately attacked the whole electricity workers union.

If the government was obliged to take action, it is not to close union’s offices in this very provocative way and threaten to punish union leaders under the terrorism act without legal justification, requesting the intervention of the police as if the Iraq has entered in a state of emergency. The Ministry has become the judge and jury.

This is inacceptable to the GFIW. The GFIW insists on adherence to democratic values and practices and refuse all forms of threats, intimidation and violence. The GFIW never used threats or violence aimed at damage to public property. Iraqi workers, including public sector workers have a proud and glorious history of struggle in defending and building our home, Iraq. The GFIW will never hesitate to use all peaceful methods guaranteed by our democratic constitution to stand up for the rights of workers to free and independent trade unions. The GFIW always said that public properties belong to all people of Iraq that must be protected for they are not the property of one person or one party and thus reject the linking Iraqi unions to terrorism.

The GFIW calls on the Ministry of Electricity to cancel its Ministerial Order and stop all its union procedures and decisions. And adopt a course of cooperation and coordination with the GFIW in a spirit of solidarity and responsibility in order that we all can contribute to resolve problems facing this national institution (electricity sector) that has suffered from various forms of financial and administrative corruption and sabotage in order to secure the supply of electricity to our people.

Executive Committee

GFIW

24 July 2010

[2010-07-01] Iraq: Cooperation delivers quality training for Iraqi teachers

A long planned programme for training and development of teacher trade unionism in Iraq has begun under the expert guidance of NASUWT, an EI affiliate in Britain. for more information please  read this: http://www.ei-ie.org/en/news/show.php?id=1303&theme=development&final=iraq

Meanwhile, the litany of repressive policies gets longer. It is illegal to be a member of a trade union, just as it was under Saddam. Paul Bremer, the US envoy who ruled Iraq after the invasion, revived Saddam’s infamous “decree 150″ in 2004, effectively banning all public sector unions. Activists are now treated as if they were terrorists. Only last week troops and police raided the offices of workers’ unions across the country, following a government decree under the 2005 anti-terrorism act, to ban them and seize their assets. For more information read the whole article here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jul/28/too-late-blix-iraq-chilcot

By Kari Lydersen

Last week electricity union offices across Iraq were raided under a July 20 decree from the Minister of Oil and Electricity, Hussain al-Shahristani, which banned trade unions in the energy sector and threatened serious legal action against union activity. The decree includes these provisions: For more information please click here: http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/6260/iraqi_electricity_union_offices_raided_under_draconian_anti-union_decr/

Iraq government shutters union offices across country in lightening raids

Iraqi troops and police have raided the offices of the Electricity Union all across Iraq, implementing a new decree – the latest in an escalating series of antiunion measures designed to incapacitate and destroy the Iraqi labor movement. For more information please click here: http://www.uslaboragainstwar.org/

The news from Iraq this week has not been good. After weeks of popular protest against power cuts which led in some cases to deaths and injuries at the hands of the police, Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani was given the Electricity Ministry too, and on 21 July he issued an order to raid, seize property from and close down the  offices of electricity unions, on the basis that Iraqi law still bans unions in the public sector – a law dating from the Saddam era, and still on the statute books. For more information please click here: http://blogs.amnesty.org.uk/blogs_entry.asp?eid=6826

Global trade union and civil society outrage was heard loud and clear last week by the latest setback to reconstruction in Iraq. The Iraqi government, on 20 July, invoked a ministerial order to shut and seize all offices and property of electrical workers’ trade unions.  For more information please click here: http://www.icem.org/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/3919-Outrage-at-Iraq

By Ben Lando of Iraq Oil Report
Published July 26, 2010

BAGHDAD – Weeks after taking office, acting Electricity Minister Hussain al-Shahristani over the weekend ordered all union organizing be banned from ministry facilities, and rounded up documents and computers in Basra.

The move has been condemned by Iraqi unions and American and international labor groups as carrying on Saddam Hussein’s legal oppression of Iraqi workers’ rights. for more information please click here: http://www.iraqoilreport.com/energy/electricity/shahristani-clamps-down-on-electricity-unions-4857/