The Egyptian Workers and Trade Unions Watch issued two (Arabic) reports with two case studies of workers’ struggles in June.
The first report is on the fight for job contracts by the government workers. And the second report is on the Mansoura-España Garments Company occupation.
I received a query from a reader asking for more details about the Wal-Mart-Mansoura-España connection.
According to a source at Mansoura-España, Wal-Mart was a client from at least 2003 to 2006. There are no figures available yet, but Wal-Mart orders, according to the source, used to be given to Misr Garments Company and the Giza Spinning and Weaving Company, which in turn used to subcontract the Mansoura-España for the job. Wal-Mart used to send US “inspectors” to the Mansoura-España to monitor “quality,” which means Wal-Mart was well aware of the abusive working conditions of the (largely female) labor force in the Talkha factory. The last shipment of shirts sent out from the factory to Wal-Mart was in 2006. There is no exact date available yet, but I’m told the factory worked on this shipment roughly from Feb to June 2006.
Around 50 Kefaya activists in Mansoura demonstrated today in front of the United Bank, to protest the bank’s mistreatment of its Mansoura-España Garments Company workers. Simultaneously, a trade unionist delegation arrived in Cairo for negotiations with the Labor Ministry, the bank’s management, and the General Federation, only to find their meeting was postponed till tomorrow as Hussein Megawer the head of the Federation did not show up, according to a trade unionist, because he was busy with visitors from the US.
Meanwhile, the United Bank continued its crackdown on the factory workers, referring six new names for disciplinary board, on charges of instigating a strike, which may decree a new wave of sacking:
Sahar Shouman
Lawahez Ali
Badri Bedeir
Saad Abdel ‘Al
Hanaa Abdel Wahab
Mohsen Abdel Nabi