No Labour Laws in iraq: Employers Pick Workers’ Representatives

A fight between the major trade unions in Basra and that state’s authorities highlights the lack of real labour laws in Iraq. Saddam Hussein-era laws mean that here, the employer gets to elect the union representatives and ignore workers’ wishes.

The premises of the local federation of trade union organizations in Basra are located in a side street in the centre of the southern Iraqi city. A few meters away there’s a local fire station. And, as some local wits have been heard to say recently, it’s a good thing the fire engines are there. Because soon they may be needed to put out the raging fire caused by hostilities between the trade unionists and the state authorities.

According to their website the General Federation of Iraqi Workers (GFIW) “is the main national trade union centre in Iraq. It brings together workers, regardless of gender, age religion and ethnicity, in pursuit of commons aims of a free and democratic Iraq”. for more information please click here: http://www.niqash.org/articles/?id=3092