Here’s a video of the rally held in Portsmouth, during the British public sector workers’ strike 16 July. The solidarity statement sent by Egyptian labor organizers in Mahalla, Cairo, Giza and Helwan was read out during the rally by a striker from the SWP.
Tag: unions
Solidarity with the Mahalla 49
From Stop the War Coalition, UK…
Press release: 7 August 2008
FOR IMMEDIATE USE
Trade union leaders, human rights campaigners denounce Egyptian “show trials”
A delegation of human rights activists and trade unionists will hand in a petition to the Egyptian embassy in London today, 7 August, calling for the release of 49 Egyptian citizens arrested in the wake of workers’ strikes and protests in the industrial city of Mahalla al-Kubra in April.
The 48 men and 1 woman are facing trial this Saturday (9 August) in the Emergency High State Security Criminal Court, which is described by Human Rights Watch as a court “where procedures violate fair trial rights”.
Human rights campaigners following the case in Egypt have told us that if convicted, they expect sentences of 6 – 10 years (although the relevant articles of the penal code allow much longer sentences including life imprisonment in some cases).Mark Serwotka, leader of the civil servants’ trade union PCS, Journalists’ Union leader Jeremy Dear and campaigning human rights lawyer Louise Christian are among the signatories to the letter which condemns the Egyptian government for using testimony extracted under torture in the case.
==============================================
Notes to editors:
Delegation to the Egyptian Embassy in London – Thursday 7th August, 4.30pm
Embassy of the Arab Republic of Egypt, 26 South Street, London W1K 1DW
For more information contact cairoconference@stopwar.org.uk
For more information about the trial see this solidarity website organized
by campaigners in Egypt: https://abtalelmahalla.blogspot.com/ (English translation at bottom of page)
On allegations that some of the detainees have been tortured and testimonies of torture from others detained during the same events in Mahalla and since released please see this report by Human Rights Watch.
http://hrw.org/english/docs/2008/07/18/egypt19391.htm=================================================
Solidarity with the people of Mahalla
Stop the show trial of Egyptian protestersWe the undersigned express our full solidarity with the 49 Egyptian citizens, whom the Mubarak regime has decided to prosecute in an Emergency High State Security Criminal Court, accused of involvement in the two day uprising in the Nile Delta town of Mahalla in April. On the 6th and 7th April, Mubarak’s troops occupied, Ghazl el-Mahalla, the biggest textile mill in the Middle East, home to 27,000 workers, aborting a strike announced by the independent Textile Workers’ League in protest at spiralling food prices and to demand a raise in the minimum wage which has remained stagnant since 1984.
The troops used live ammunition, tear gas, water cannons and sticks against the peaceful protesters in the town who took to the streets after the crushing of the strike. At least three were killed, and hundreds were injured and detained. The 49 detainees face a list of trumped up charges, to which some have confessed under torture. They will be tried in an exceptional court, systematically denounced by human rights watchdogs for lacking the international standards for a “safe and just trial.” We call on the Egyptian dictatorship to release them immediately.
Mark Serwotka, General Secretary, Public and Commercial Services union
(PCS), UK
Jeremy Dear, General Secretary, National Union of Journalists (NUJ), UK
Jane Loftus, President, Postal Executive, Communication Workers’ Union
(CWU), UK
Trevor Ngwane – Anti-Privatisation Forum, South Africa
Professor Alex Callinicos, King’s College, London, UK
Eamonn McCann, journalist and anti-war campaigner, Ireland
Richard Boyd-Barrett, People not Profit Alliance, Ireland
Lindsey German, Stop the War Coalition, UK
Chris Nineham, Stop the War Coalition, UK
James Eaden, National Executive, University and College Union (UCU), UK
Liz Davies, Secretary, Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers, UK
Richard Harvey, Bureau Member, International Association of Democratic
Lawyers
Louise Christian, Human rights lawyer, Christian Khan solicitors, UK
John Rees, Cairo Conference (UK)
John McDermott UNISON NEC, UK
Rob Owen, National Union of Students, National Executive, UK
Dave Lewis, National Union of Students, National Treasurer, UK
Katie Dalton, National Union of Students, Wales, UK
Susan Nash, National Union of Students, National Executive, UK
Beth Walker, National Union of Students, Vice President, UK
Ama Uzowuru, National Union of Students, Vice President, UK
Elizabeth Somerville, National Union of Students, National Executive, UK
Bellavia Ribeiro-Addy, National Union of Students, Black Students Officer, UK
Herbert Docena, Focus on the Global South researcher, (Philippines)
Professor Colin Sparks, Westminster University, UK
Professor Gilbert Achcar, School of Oriental and African Studies, UK
Professor Claudio Katz, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina
Rebecca Branford, MoC, NUJ BBC White City, UK
Graham Dyer, President, UCU, School of Oriental and African Studies, UK
Donny Gluckstein, National Executive, Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS)
Penny Glover, National Executive, Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS)
Explo Nani-Kofi, African Liberation Support Campaign (ALISC)
Geoff Brown, Secretary, Manchester Trades Council, UK
Umut Kocagöz, National Executive Committee of GENÇ-SEN (Student Union of
Turkey)
Gözde Mutlucan, National Executive Committee of GENÇ-SEN (Student Union of
Turkey)
Zeliha Kabataş, National Executive Committee of GENÇ-SEN (Student
Union of Turkey)
Kıvanç Eliaçık, National Executive Committee of GENÇ-SEN
(Student Union of Turkey)
Simin Gürdal, National Executive Committee of GENÇ-SEN (Student Union of
Turkey)
Ozan Ersan (National Membership Organizer and International Officer),
GENÇ-SEN (Student Union of Turkey)
Donatella Binacardi, delegata sindacale SdL Intercategoriale, Italy
Reynaldo de Guzman, National Chairperson, Philippine Peace and Solidarity
Council
Karen Evans, University and College Union, National Executive
Karen Reissmann, Unison, Manchester Community Mental Health Branch
Jacques Bidet, Professeur émérite à l’Université de Paris-X
Sami Ramadani, Writer and academic, London
Sabah Jawad, Iraqi Democrats against the Occupation
Plataforma Aturem la Guerra (Stop the War Platform, Barcelona)
Guy Taylor, Globalise Resistance UK
Dave Barnes, National Executive, Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association
(TSSA)
And 570 other signatories. All signatures are in a personal capacity
Doctors’ group lashes out against wage increase provisos
Sarah Carr reports:
Lobby group Doctors Without Rights have criticized the conditions attached to wage increases under a ministerial decree passed last month.
Ministerial decree 318 — passed in response to the wage increase demands of doctors employed by the Ministry of Health — pegs the percentage wage increases doctors will receive to their seniority and specialty.
Percentage increases, termed in the decree as a “doctor’s incentive payment,” range between 30 percent and 400 percent.
Article 3 of the decree provides that “the payment of these incentive payments is linked to the availability of finances.”
Doctors Without Rights says in a statement on its website that this connection makes the payment of the increase “extremely uncertain.”
It further criticizes the classification of the increase as an “incentive payment.”
Following a meeting between representatives of the Doctors’ Syndicate and Minister of Health Hatem El-Gabaly last month, the syndicate published details of the wage increases promised by the Ministry of Health before decree 318 was made public.
The syndicate had said that from November 2008, pay will be linked to performance but that only 30 percent of a doctor’s salary would be linked to performance evaluation.
“The increase is an incentive payment and will therefore, without doubt, be subject to evaluation,” the Doctors Without Rights statement reads.
“The ministerial decree does not, however, put in place any clear criteria for this evaluation.
“Furthermore, it does not confirm the Minister [of Health]’s verbal promises that the payment of 70 percent of these increases will be fixed while payment of only 30 percent of the increase would be contingent on evaluation,” the statement continues.
Doctors Without Rights are also fiercely critical of the vast differences in percentage increases allocated to specialists compared with what is promised to resident doctors, and question whether this is “an attempt by the ministry to break the ranks of doctors and weaken their strength.”
Under the decree resident doctors will receive an increase of 300 percent while specialist doctors will receive a 30 percent increase.
“While the ministry’s official response is that this is the first phase, the verbal promises made about the second and third phases have not resulted in any official decisions with regards to timing [of future payments] or the amounts due.”
The statement goes on to refer to Ministry of Health officials who are reported to have said that specialists enjoy better financial circumstances than those of residents because of the stability of their private work.
Low wages within the public health sector force many doctors to seek work in private clinics in order to supplement their salaries. After 20 years in the profession, a Ministry of Health-employed doctor may receive a monthly salary of only LE 700.
“We are amazed that the ministry calculates what a doctor’s entitlements are on the basis of their estimation of the income he receives from his private work,” Doctors Without Rights said in the statement.
“What if the doctor is not privately employed? Will the Ministry sympathize and accept that he puts aside the years of experience he has obtained and be demoted to a resident doctor?”
Doctors Without Rights are calling for a 300 percent across the board increase for all Ministry of Health doctors. The group is currently collecting doctors’ signatures which will be sent to the Ministry of Health as part of their campaign for improved wages.
The group also underlined the necessity of scrapping article 3 of the decree and renews their demand for a LE 300 occupational diseases allowance voted for at the last general assembly of the Tanta Syndicate.
In July, Doctors Without Right member Dr Mona Mina told Daily News Egypt, “We have not yet received this, and would prefer that we be guaranteed this small sum rather than be promised a bigger pay increase which we never actually receive.”
For its part, the Doctors’ Syndicate in a statement issued yesterday on its website said it was “following up on the implementation of the decree within three months.”
It thanked doctors for “standing behind the syndicate” and said that it would “not waiver from its demand for a minimum wage.”
In February, a general assembly meeting of the Doctors’ Syndicate voted unanimously for a two-hour symbolic strike to bring attention to doctors’ demands for a LE 1,000 minimum wage.
While syndicate leadership initially endorsed the strike action, it took the decision to “postpone” it without consulting doctors after Prime Minister Ahmad Nazif said during a radio interview that strikes by public sector workers are illegal.
Doctors Without Rights organized a weeklong sit-in on the steps of the syndicate in protest at the decision, which was ignored by syndicate leadership who dismissed the group as an “unrepresentative minority.”
Doctors Without Rights have launched a legal case to prove the legality of strikes by public sector-employed doctors.