Labour anger does not end with Mubarak

In international media reports on the revolt in Egypt, the role played by working people in bringing about this historic change has been totally ignored.  Emad Mekay fills in on this missing dimension.

BEFORE his ouster on 11 February, toppled Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak had made one of the biggest mistakes of his reign: not learning the lessons from hundreds of small labour and professional strikes that littered the country since 2005. These were the actual precursors to the 25 January Revolution that ended his 30-year autocratic rule.

'We were lucky that the regime failed, in its arrogance and aloofness, to draw lessons from the many strikes and protests over the past five years,' said Mohammed Fathy, 46, a labour activist in El-Mahalla, whose bid for office in the government-sponsored General Labour Union was stifled because of his anti-regime views.

'We were even luckier that they didn't understand that there were genuine economic, professional and labour grievances, especially here in El-Mahalla on 6 April 2008.'

It was on 6 April 2008 that Egypt saw the first example, in decades, of labour action spilling over into a popular uprising - a mini-revolution on the streets of this industrial city that attracted men, women and children.

It was here that labour activists organised two days of massive protests that saw local residents leaving their homes, and pulling down Mubarak's pictures and posters for the first time since he came to office in 1981.

That signalled the birth of the anti-Mubarak Internet activists' group, the April 6 Movement which took its name from that historic day.

Less than three years later, the group helped organise the events of 25 January 2011. This time, they succeeded in pulling down not only Mubarak's pictures but Mubarak himself.

Had Mubarak taken note of the labour protests, he may have learned some ways to pre-empt or foil the 25 January Revolution, labour leaders say.

'The reaction of the Mubarak supporters was that we are just a bunch of kids who can be easily crushed by the police. Their only response was more and more security - nothing political and nothing economic. They didn't realise how upset the country's labour force is,' Fathy said.

The country's labour force is upset indeed - even today, days after Mubarak's ouster. Years of police harassment, anti-worker policies and poor economic conditions have left a deep scar on the country's workers who until today feel left out of a rightful place.

Little wonder then that labour protests continue unabated, prompting the Supreme Council for the Armed Forces, which is running the country, to issue its fifth communique specifically calling on labour leaders to tone down their protests.

The interim government of Ahmed Shafiq had complained to the Supreme Council that continuing strikes are not helping bring life back to normal in this nation of 85 million.

Almost every sector of the economy, from chemicals production to schools and telecommunications, is being affected.

The Central Bank of Egypt had to give the banking sector an unplanned holiday on 14 February, to go with a religious holiday the next day, in a bid to foil growing strikes among bank workers demanding investigation into high payments for top executives.

Even the police are blaming poor pay for corruption within the force, and are protesting for better job benefits.

This wave of post-Mubarak strikes is highlighting a split among labour leaders, between those who want immediate benefits for workers in the heat of the moment and those who want to give the new caretaker government some time to catch its breath, and time to meet labour demands.

'We should give the new rule some time, but fight for rights still,' said Mohamed Mourad, a railway worker and labour activist in El-Mahalla.

Mourad said Mubarak's fall is meanwhile good news for the country's disgruntled workforce, as it means an end to some of the anti-worker policies.

'With Mubarak gone, his policies that impoverished workers and pulverised independent labour unions will be gone too,' said Mourad, as he sipped black tea in his railway office surrounded by several co-workers nodding in support.

Mourad specifically mentioned policies of privatising state-run companies, tampering with labour union elections, and police interference as impediments that will sink with Mubarak.

While this may be true, it still doesn't offer immediate relief for impatient workers, suppressed and suffering for years.

Here in El-Mahalla, the average base salary for textile workers at Egypt for Weaving and Spinning, the largest textile factory in the Middle East with 25,000 workers, is only 600 Egyptian pounds ($102). Most workers end up working one or more extra jobs.

For that to be corrected, they suggest that the new government work to confiscate billions of dollars in wealth of corrupt members of the former regime and invest that for the benefit of workers.

Mubarak spent heavily on security and that could be trimmed too to re-channel funds for the impoverished workers, according to Hamdi Hussein, a leading labour activist.

Labour leaders say that most strikes and labour protests have three goals: ending corruption at the top management at some companies, increasing the minimum base wage to at least 1,500 Egyptian pounds ($255), and holding free elections for labour unions.

'If those three demands are not met soon,' said Hussein, who works for the Coordinating Committee for Labour Freedoms and Rights, 'workers will continue to act until the revolution means real change for them.' - IPS                

*Third World Resurgence No. 245/246, January/February 2011, pp 41-42