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<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
The Council of Global Unions (CGU) sponsored the ‘Quality Public Services’ Conference in Geneva 12-14 October, bringing together leaders of trade unions, municipal governments, and civil society, to take a strong stand in unity against further cuts to public services. 
 
Public services are under threat throughout the world as many governments look to cut spending and follow austerity measures encouraged by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The members of the CGU, who represent 176 million working men and women, reject this and last week pledged to work together with civil society to promote investment in quality public services as the key solution to the global economic crisis. 
<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/globalunions.gif" width="100" height="100" alt=""/>
The 400 conference delegates announced a global campaign, guided by a charter and action plan. 
 
CGU chair Aidan White said, “This is a call to the trade union movement to advance its historic responsibility to work in broad social coalitions and act as a force for social change that improves the quality of life for all citizens. We don’t have time to lose.” 
 
Susan Hopgood, president of Education International, said, “We are conveying a powerful message in uniting as advocates for strong schools, decent health services and social services, clean water and proper sanitation, effective fire and security services, affordable housing and utilities, accessible communications and transport, public media and culture, and good public administration and municipal services. Quality public services provide the foundation for sustainable growth, equitable redistribution of wealth, and the means for justice, good governance, and the exercise of democracy.” 
 
Kumi Naidoo, executive director of Greenpeace International and council member of Global Call to Action Against Poverty, called for “a new activism” to back demands for quality public services as the foundation for social justice policies. 
 
Visit <a href="http://www.RadioLabour.org">www.RadioLabour.org</a> for audio links to daily and summary reports of the conference.

Quality Public Services Conference Offers Alternative to Austerity

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While the world’s euphoria was centered on the successful rescue of 33 Chilean miners, 26 Chinese miners were killed and another 11 remain missing today following a gas rush that suffocated miners just metres beneath the surface through a massive coal dust cloud. The accident happened on 16 October at the Henan mine of Pingyu Coal and Electric Co. in Yuzhou, Henan province. 
 
The tragedy occurred when a hole was being drilled to release pressure caused by a methane gas build-up. The miners were buried when an estimated 173,000 cubic metres of gas rushed out, resulting in miners’ being buried in a coal dust concentration totaling 2,500 tonnes. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/04miningsafety.jpg" width="180" height="132"/>
Rescue attempts were still ongoing early today for the missing 11, but hopes that they were alive were slim. They were only 50 metres beneath the surface. Some 239 miners did escape. 
 
The gas level inside the mine was detected at 40% just prior to the accident, far above normal levels that average one percent. 
 
Pingyu Coal and Electric Co. is owned by a consortium of four enterprises, including the China Power Investment Corp. and Zhong Ping Energy Chemical Group. In 2008, 23 miners perished in the same colliery from a methane gas explosion. 
 
On 15 October, a day before the Chinese tragedy and less than 30 hours after the last of the 33 Chilean miners were pulled to the surface, three of four miners died following a tunnel collapse inside the Casa Negra gold and silver mine of Minesadco in El Oro province, Ecuador. The mine employs 100 workers and the accident happened when workers were digging a short distance from where the collapse occurred. Rescue efforts continued today to local the fourth miner, believed either trapped deeper inside the mine or killed by the rock collapse.

37 Chinese Coal Miners Feared Dead in Henan Province Coal Dust Tragedy

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Negotiations between the United Steelworkers Local 7-669 and Honeywell Inc. failed 11-12 October to resolve a company-imposed lockout on 228 union members at a uranium conversion plant in the US. The failure to resolve the 17-week lockout in Metropolis, Illinois, means scab workers will continue to mix dangerous chemicals in a process that mills yellow-cake uranium into uranium hexafluoride (UF6), and then is sold to nuclear enrichment facilities. 
 
The talks last week were the third set of bi-lateral negotiations since the lockout began on 28 June. Progress was made on the first day on one of the major issues – health coverage and retiree medical insurance – but talks broke down on 12 October over retirement benefits and Honeywell’s demand to create a two-tier pension scheme. Talks could re-start within the next few weeks. 
 
Other issues separating USW and Honeywell are the transnational’s insistence on gaining broad contracting-out rights, a weakening of workers’ seniority rights, and hours of work. The company is offering a 3% wage increase, but its other demands are so detrimental to workers’ interests that the union has countered with a wage freeze and continuance of the current entitlement terms. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1009.usw.superman.jpg" width="128" height="192"/>
Metropolis, the fictional home of Superman, is now a US nuclear safety risk 
Honeywell, together with subcontracting agent the Shaw Group, has used US political leverage to gain certification from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), allowing the use of 200 replacement workers to perform dangerous tasks inside the nuclear supply chain. 
 
After initially signaling to USW Local 7-669 that it would not operate the plant during the lockout, Honeywell in July began staffing the conversion plant with scabs provided by the Shaw Group, and moved Honeywell supervisors from other areas to Metropolis. On 3 September, the NRC granted approval to Honeywell to re-start the final two steps of a four-step converting process. 
 
On 5 September, the town of Metropolis in southern Illinois along the Ohio River was shook by a loud boom that could be heard two kilometers away. Inside the plant, accumulated hydrogen reacted with fluorine gas during a venting process, causing the boom. NRC inspectors were on site at the time, and local police came to the scene. A NRC spokesman said the accident occurred in a non-regulated area of operation, meaning away from the handling of yellow cake uranium. Honeywell and the NRC jointly stated no damage to assets occurred and no one was injured. 
 
The Honeywell plant in Metropolis is the only such uranium conversion plant in the US and takes yellow cake uranium from Canada, Russia, and Australia and transforms it into UF6 through the four-stage process. That process includes ore preparation, through green salt preparation, to fluorination and distillation, before frozen and shipped to nuclear enrichment sites in US sites of Portsmouth, Ohio, and Paducah, Kentucky, as well as to plants in Russia and some Asian countries. 
 
A previous ICEM report on this US lockout is <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/3977-Lockout-of-USW-represented-Uranium-Processing-Plant-in-US-Continues " type="internal">here</a>.

Talks Fail Between USW, Honeywell in US Uranium Lockout

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The ICEM was saddened to hear of the death on 10 September of Mahjoub Ben Seddik, the Secretary-General of the Union Marocaine du Travail (UMT), who died in Paris at the age of 88. He was buried in the “cimitiere des chouhadas,” the martyrs cemetery in Casablanca, Morocco. 
 
In attendance at the funeral were the entire political class of Morocco, encompassing leaders of political parties, past and present government ministers, trade union centres, as well as numerous Moroccan intellectuals and wider civil society. All had gathered to pay homage to a great trade union leader who had been of massive importance in the trade union world, and the Moroccan struggle for independence. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1010.Mahjoub Ben Seddik.JPG" width="130" height="160"/>
Mahjoub Ben Seddik, the late Secretary-General of the Union Marocaine du Travail (UMT) 
In a message of condolences, Manfred Warda, ICEM General Secretary, echoed the words of UMT national official, Milourdi Moukharik, in stating: “Moroccan workers, their trade union movement, as well as the Arab trade union world, and indeed the international trade union movement, have lost a great leader and fighter for trade union independence and struggle. 
 
“He founded and continued to lead a vibrant and independent trade union structure firmly grounded in the workplace. The ICEM and the whole international trade union movement have lost a good friend and colleague. His passing really seems to be the end of an era.” 
 
Mahjoub Ben Seddik spent his entire life defending the interests of the Moroccan workers. He never deviated from his conviction that the trade union movement should be independent of political parties, but at the same time was immensely political. He played a major role in the struggle for Moroccan independence and was imprisoned for two years in 1952 and again in 1954 before independence was achieved in 1956. 
 
He remained an active leader of UMT until his death and was a key supporter of wider international trade union, and the work of the ICEM in particular. UMT has been an active ICEM member for many years and has played an important role in the Global Union Federation’s recent increased activities throughout the Middle East/North Africa Region (MENA), with Abdesalam Mansour being the MENA member of the ICEM Executive Committee.

ICEM Mourns Moroccan Trade Union Leader Mahjoub Ben Seddik

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A third meeting recently was held among trade unions and community groups of the Fako District of Cameroon in Buea to promote trade union cohesion. Cameroon Regional Delegate of Labour and Social Security Marie Catherine Kalati Lobe has been chairing the sessions, first started in June, and the forums are aggressively tackling issues regarding transportation, agriculture, and education, as well as a current labour issue at the state-run Société Nationale de Raffinage (SONARA) oil refinery at Cape Lembeh Limbe. 
 
Sector unions numbering about 12, some affiliated with the Confederation of Cameroon Trade Unions (CCTU), the General Federation of Free Workers of Cameroon (CGTTLC), and the Confederation of Cameroon Autonomous Trade Unions (CCATU), attended the most recent workshop in early October. They moved forward an agenda on the development of a common sense of purpose to enhance workers’ welfare and to improve the social climate. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Cameroon.png" width="150" height="69"/>
Issues raised included consistent judicial delays on labour cases, the requisite standards for inclusion in a re-written labour code, and employer resistance in allowing union representation inside workplaces. Specifically at this month’s meetings, grievances were heard over the low wages and long hours of agricultural workers in banana plantations, lack of paid leave for support staff of the University of Buea, in contrast to the teaching staff, and the influx of clandestine transportation modes in Fako District, most notably by police and law enforcement. 
 
Discussion also centered on the lack of movement in negotiations between management and the union – the Fako Petroleum Workers’ Union – at the country’s only refinery, the 37,000 barrel-per-day Limbe refinery that processes light crude imported from neighbouring Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea. The state refinery, started with the assistance of Elf and later Total, is currently undergoing a large capitalisation project.

Cameroon Trade Unions in Fako Meet to Improve Social Climate

<img height="39" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" alt=""/>
The ICEM affiliate, Turkish Electricity Authority of Cyprus Workers’ Trade Union (EL-SEN), conducted its General Assembly on 10 July 2010. The assembly was convened under the banner of anti-privatisation in the capital city Nicosia in central Cyprus. 
 
President Tuluy Kalyoncu was re-elected to continue as head of the trade union, with 171 votes, while a second candidate received 24 votes. 
 
The only candidate for General Secretary of EL-SEN, Huseyin Sonmezoglu, was re-elected to that position. The newly elected Executive Board will consist of Turgut Evlat, Ozan Alciner, Subhi Ozpasa, Ercan Koseoglu, Orhan Gurgoze, Ozgur Uzuner, Caglayan Cesurer, Toprak Altay, and Kamil Ozinal. 
<img height="159" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1007.el.sen[1].jpg" width="320" alt=""/>
Bulent Erzeybek was elected as Assistant Secretary General, while Suphi Ozpasa was elected Financial Secretary, Ercan Koseoglu Education Secretary, Saffet Asiksoy Foreign Relations Secretary, Huseyin Korkmaz Organizing Secretary, Ozgur Uzuner Social Affairs Secretary, and Serhan Kayar was elected as Secretary of Propaganda. 
 
The General Assembly adopted four resolutions. Delegates resolved to struggle for peace and a solution to the Cyprus problem. Also prioritised was the need to continue education programmes for members. 
 
Delegates adopted a strong resolution against the government’s moves toward privatisation of the Turkish Electricity Authority of Cyprus (KIB-TEK). Congress accused the government of misleading the public on the financial condition of the company. 
 
ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda wrote to congratulate EL-SEN on its successful Congress.

Turkish-Cypriot Electricity Workers’ Take Stand Against Privatisation

<img height="39" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" alt=""/>
A diamond-mining strike in Namibia was averted two weeks ago after eleventh hour negotiations by ICEM affiliate Mineworkers Union of Namibia (MUN), the country’s trade union centre, National Union of Namibian Workers, the government, and Namdeb, the joint venture between DeBeers and the Namibian government, proved successful on 9 July. 
 
Some 2,800 miners of the Oranjemund branch of the MUN were poised to strike on 12 July over failure to grant salary increases during the financial crisis, while managers were given salary adjustments. In contract reopener talks that began in April, the MUN branch also sought housing allowances, remote allowance, and annual leave. 
<img height="80" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/NamibiaFlag.gif" width="120" alt=""/>
The two-year contract that was agreed to calls for a 2010 10% wage increase, retroactive to 1 April 2010, and a housing allowance increase of 9%. A remote allowance increase of 10% is pegged to the midpoint of salary scales, and next year’s wage increase will equal the consumer price index. 
 
The ICEM commends the national leadership of the MUN for achieving such excellent terms. Namdeb is a 50/50 joint venture between the government and DeBeers and once was part of the Oppenheimer family’s Consolidated Diamonds Mines, founded in colonial times in 1920. The mines, both onshore and now off, are located in the southwestern Namib Desert near the coast and by the Orange River.

Miners in Namibia, Namdeb Agree to Contract Terms at Diamond Operation

<img height="39" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" alt=""/>
The ICEM encourages affiliates and labour activists in South Africa to apply, this week, to a Masters Degree programme in "Labour and Globalisation” at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. 
 
The ILO’s Global Labour University (GLU) Masters programme at Witwatersrand began in 2007, and focuses on Southern Africa and the Global South. The deadline for submission for the upcoming course is 31 July 2010. 
 
The programme has a special focus on “Labour and Development.” It aims to build capacity and competence for trade unions to enable constructive engagement in policy proposals that can make a difference and improve the position of working people and society at large within the context of sustainable development. 

<img height="91" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ILO.jpg" width="98" alt=""/>
GLU courses are taught in English. More detailed information about the specific profiles of the programmes and the application form are available <a href="http://www.global-labour-university.org/3.html ">here</a>. 
 
The ILO’s Bureau for Workers’ Activities (ACTRAV) and its project partners will award a limited number of scholarships to applicants from developing and transition economies. Applicants need to have the endorsement of a trade union to apply for a scholarship. 
 
The GLU has also developed and is initiating this year a shorter, six-month programme called “Engage” that is intended for trade union workers and others around a targeted and specific curriculum. The ICEM is actively encouraging trade unionists from Brazil, India, and southern African countries to apply. More on that programme, with the next application deadline coming 1 November 2010, can be <a href="http://www.global-labour-university.org/216.html ">here</a>. 
 
The six-year-old GLU has trained trade unionists in economics and in social sciences from 49 countries in its short existence. Courses are offered in English, women are strongly encouraged to participate, applicants should, as a rule, not be over age 40, and the endorsement of a trade union is a requirement for a scholarship. The scholarship is combined with a €1,500 contribution made by a trade union or other donor.

31 July Deadline Looming for GLU Courses in South Africa

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ICEM affiliate Petrol-İş, the Petroleum, Chemical, and Rubber Workers’ Union of Turkey, used manifestations and ICEM intervention to win reinstatement for 11 union activists at a plastics factory in Orhangazi, Bursa province. The factory is owned by French-based auto-parts supplier Faurecia. 
 
A month after the successful conclusion of renewal negotiations between Petrol-İş and the company, talks underscored by the fact that auto exterior parts-maker Faurecia Polifleks Otomotiv Sanayi ve Ticaret A.Ş. would be expanding and adding 50 new workers, local management on 23 July sacked the 11 union activists, including two local branch leaders and a shop steward. No reason was given for the firings. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1008.petrolis.jpg" width="240" height="180"/>
Petrol-İş reported that the hostile actions easily escalated tensions inside a factory employing 306 in Turkey’s automotive manufacturing hub. On 27 July, ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda intervened, and in a letter to Faurecia Chairman and CEO Yann Delabriere, said: 
 
“The ICEM understands that an enterprise collective agreement was concluded between Petrol-İş and Faurecia Polifleks Otomotiv Sanayi ve Ticaret A.Ş. on 21 June 2010. But just after signing the agreement, management immediately dismissed 11 trade union members of Petrol-İş, including the chief trade union representative and two local branch officers. The ICEM considers this egregious discrimination against workers who practice legitimate trade union rights. Further, this is a flagrant violation of international-recognised labour standards.” 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1008.petrolis.2.jpg" width="240" height="144"/>
At the front of the factory, scores of Petrol-İş members took up protests, while talks between the union’s executive members and managers started to address the discharges. Finally, on 29 July, the talks ended in a “mutual framework of goodwill,” according to Petrol-İş, and local mangers agreed to reinstate the union leaders. 
 
“In this process,” said Petrol-İş General Secretary Mustafa Çavdar, “international support and solidarity provided by the ICEM contributed to solve the conflict. Many thanks to the ICEM for its valuable contributions.” Petrol-İş has had a collective bargaining relationship with the company dating back to 1985. 
 
Faurecia operates some 190 factories in 30 countries, producing car seats, auto-exhaust systems, vehicle interior and door modules, and exterior parts. PSA Peugeot Citroën controls 57% of Faurecia’s stock, while One Equity Partners – a private equity company from which Faurecia recently bought US-based auto-exhaust factories – holds a 17% share.

Petrol-İş Gets Jobs Back for Turkish Activists at Auto-Parts Supplier Faurecia

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After three days of a partial petrol blockade on the federal capital district of Abuja, Nigeria, ICEM affiliate Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) and the union’s tank-truck drivers lifted the strike on 6 August. That occurred when government ministers and leaders of NUPENG and PENGASSAN, ICEM’s Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association affiliate, met and crafted memorandums of understanding on both the worsening conditions of Nigerian roads and the repugnant and growing use of casual labour by oil and gas companies, particularly multinational concerns. 
 
NUPENG did, however, issue a 14-day strike notice to the government on another issue: that of rehabilitation of Nigeria’s Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA). If the federal government does not call together a forum to correct the lack of transparency and alleged willful mis-allocation of products to marketers, NUPENG will strike the oil and gas depots of several multinationals across the Niger Delta later in August. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/IgweAchese.NUPENG.PRES.jpg" width="165" height="220"/>
NUPENG President Achese Igwe
“There is serious corruption inside the allocation process of petroleum products,” said NUPENG President Achese Igwe. “We question the activities of the PPPRA in allocating products to marketers of unknown identity, and the PPPRA has shown no interest in revealing records or data on fuel allocations.” 
 
Friday’s meeting did create separate memorandums on road conditions and on casualisation. Meeting with Minister of Labour and Productivity Chukwuemeka Wogu, Minister of State for Works Chris Ogiemwonyi, officials of both the Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. (NNPC) and the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas Co. (NNLG), and the employers’ grouping of multinationals operating in Nigeria, the Oil Producers’ Trade Section (OPTS), leaders of NUPENG and PENGASSAN did get immediate commitments. 
 
Regarding casualisation and the ever increasing use of temporary or non-regular workers, a tripartite “Technical Working Group on Casualisation and Contract Staffing in the Oil and Gas Sector” was created. This working group will, between 30 and 90 days, produce a road map that will include analysis on why prior memorandums were not adhered to, and it must issue acceptable guarantees ensuring job security for casual workers. 
 
NUPENG and PENGASSAN insist that such staff, across all oil- and gas-producing companies, be given immediate opportunities for full-time staff positions if they have the prerequisite skills. When this is not possible, the unions demand that conditions of employment be published and strictly adhered to that grant temporary workers all work rights and social benefits that permanent workers get. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Nigeria.png" width="250" height="115"/>
Igwe said that the vast number of casual workers in oil and gas have no pension scheme and are without health insurance. 
 
Following Friday’s meeting, Wogu was thankful the short, targeted blockade of fuel products to the Abuja region was terminated, and stated, “The strike was capable of scuttling the economy because NUPENG is too strategic.” 
 
Regarding road conditions, which has caused the deaths of eight NUPENG tanker-truck drivers in the past three months, a Roads Monitoring Team was created that will consist of two members from NUPENG. Within a two-month time frame, this team will monitor roads and determine which ones need immediate improvement. 
 
Igwe stressed the importance of this issue by stating that poor road conditions have caused unnecessary stops, resulting in robberies and kidnappings of truck drivers. The risk to public safety is also inherent since poor roads causing accidents has meant monumental disasters, considering the inflammable cargos that lorries carry. 
 
On the issue of the PPPRA, Igwe said it remains a mystery as to which ministry or department of government the pricing authority reports to. The issue of transparency and accountability by the PPPRA is all-important in Nigeria with the country about to enact the Petroleum Industry Bill.

Horrid Roads, Casualisation Force Direct Action by NUPENG in Nigeria

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