Tag: unions

1978 Tunisian Intifada

Posted on By 3arabawy

[2-1-1978] Protesters attacking ruling party office, during a general strike organized by the General Union of Tunisian Workers, which turned into an intifada [Photo courtesy of the UK Socialist Worker Archives].
[2-1-1978] Protesters attacking ruling party office, during a general strike organized by the General Union of Tunisian Workers, which turned into an intifada [Photo courtesy of the UK Socialist Worker Archives].
The following paragraph is an edited excerpt from my MA thesis, which I wrote around eight years ago on the 1977 Egyptian bread intifada:

Following the 1967 war, anti-Jewish riots spread in Tunisia as well as attacks on western interests and embassies [1]. The movement, however, was soon to assume a more mature political character, with students coming in the forefront. Strikes and demonstrations continued over the following year by the students, with support of the lecturers against state repression [2]. The government noted the militant intervention of Communists and Maoists in the events [3]. It also stepped in more than once to ban demonstrations in support of the Vietnamese struggle and the French students during the May Parisian uprising [4]. Maoism became a dominant force in the Tunisian universities, drawing its main inspiration from the French student movement [5]. The radicalization reached the peak by the 1970s, to explode into a workers’ uprising led by the trade unions against the government in 1978, that was put down brutally by the security services and the army.

1] Arab Report And Record, London, 1-15 June 1967: 196.
2] Arab Report And Record, London, 16-31 March 1968: 79; 1-15 April 1968: 95-6.
3] Arab Report And Record, London, 1-15 August 1968: 229; 1-15 September 1968: 266.
4] Arab Report And Record, London, 16-31 May 1968: 138; 16-30 November 1967: 368.
5] Harmel, Muhammad. Men ‘l-Hizb al-Wahed ‘l-ta’dodya: Massira Majida le-Tahqiq al-Badil al-Demoqrati (From one Party to pluralism: a glorious march towards achieving the democratic alternative). Damascus: Markaz El-Abhath We El-Derassat El-Ishtirakyya Fi El-Alam El-Arabi, n.d., Page 47.

African Workers’ Solidarity

Posted on By 3arabawy

From the ISJ…

On 16 April [2008] news spread around the world of the arrival of a Chinese cargo ship, the An Yue Jiang, owned by China’s state shipping company, in the major container port in Durban, South Africa. The ship included three million rounds of ammunition and 1,500 rockets bound for Zimbabwe, two days drive from the port. The South African government explained to the world that there was nothing they could do: this was a legal transfer of cargo that had already been paid for by a neighbouring sovereign state. The problem was that the sovereign state of Zimbabwe was busy stealing an election and crushing the opposition. The South Africa Transport and Allied Workers Union (Satawu) refused to be browbeaten by claims of legality. The union refused to unload the ship, while Satawu truckers said that they would not transport the cargo by road. The ship was paralysed in “outer anchorage” in “off-port limits”. Within a few days trade unions with members in ports near Zimbabwe followed suit: Mozambique and Namibia also refused to unload the weapons. The ship was forced to sail to Angola, where dock workers “maintained a watch” to ensure that the 77 tons of weapons were not unloaded.

This is a fantastic show of solidarity… Very inspiring… I hope the Suez Canal workers would do the same with the US and British warships passing through the canal on their way to bomb our brothers and sisters in Iraq… There are precedents for that.. In the 1940s, the Suez Canal workers boycotted the Dutch ships heading to Indonesia to suppress the anti-Colonial revolt…