"Iraqi Oil Pipeline Workers on Strike" Monday June 4th

[slipslidingaway]

see related thread

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1044049


http://www.handsoffiraqioil.org/2007/06/iraqi-oil-pipel...

"Workers from the Iraqi Pipelines Company in Basra are on strike today.

Workers began the strike at 6.30 this morning by shutting two 14"
pipelines carrying oil and gas products inside Iraq.

The strike is over unfulfilled demands tabled by the Iraqi Federation of
Oil Unions (IFOU) - of which the Iraqi Pipelines Union is a member - to
Prime Minister Maliki on May 16th 2007. The 16 demands focus on improved
working conditions, pay, land for homes, a reduction in the national
price of fuel and crucially, inclusion in the Oil Law drafting process.

Prime Minister Maliki agreed to the Federation's demands and established
a committee comprised of Ministry of Oil, IFOU and Southern Oil Company
representatives to implement the demands.

Strike leaders say, if the government does not implement the agreement,
the 48" crude pipeline to Baghdad will be shut.

Further details including a statement from the union tba

see www.basraoilunion.org and www.handsoffiraqioil.org for further
updates"


http://www.basraoilunion.org /

http://www.handsoffiraqioil.org /

[liberal renegade]

1. stick together!

[doc03]

2. Interesting, they have unions over there?

Bush will probably send in the scabs used at AK Steel.

[Canuckistanian]

3. This is one strike Bushco won't want to break

It's just another delay in getting out the cheaper Iraqi oil.

And isn't what this whole war was about?

[wtmusic]

4. Either that or they will break it violently

and try to keep it as quiet as possible.

[Canuckistanian]

5. My point is, what's their motivation?

Anything that keeps that oil in the ground is money in Dick Cheney's pocket. Or, rather, Cheney's kids' pockets.

[mhatrw]

6. Related article

http://www.mercurynews.com/opinion/ci_6072029?nclick_check=1

Iraqi unions fight to keep oil out of corporate hands
By David Bacon
Article Launched: 06/06/2007 01:32:14 AM PDT

The Bush administration calls the Iraq occupation an exercise in democracy building. Yet from the beginning, many of the Iraqis who want democracy most are treated as its enemies - Iraq's unions. Iraq has a long labor history. Union activists, banned and jailed under the British and its puppet monarchy, organized a labor movement that was the admiration of the Arab world when Iraq became independent after 1958. Saddam Hussein later drove its leaders underground, killing and jailing the ones he could catch.

When Saddam fell, Iraqi unionists came out of prison, up from underground and back from exile, determined to rebuild their labor movement. Miraculously, in the midst of war and bombings, they did. The oil workers union in the south is now one of the largest organizations in Iraq, with thousands of members on the rigs, pipelines and refineries. The electrical workers union is the first national labor organization headed by a woman, Hashmeya Muhsin Hussein.

Together with other unions in railroads, hotels, ports, schools and factories, they've gone on strike, held elections, won wage increases, and made democracy a living reality. Yet the Bush administration, and the Baghdad government it controls, has outlawed collective bargaining, impounded union funds and turned its back (or worse) on a wave of assassinations of Iraqi union leaders.

President Bush doesn't believe what he preaches. He says he wants democracy, yet he will not accept the one political demand that unites Iraqis above all others: They want the country's oil (and its electrical power stations, ports and other key facilities) to remain in public hands. The fact that Iraqi unions are the strongest voice demanding this makes them anathema. Selling the oil off to large corporations is far more important to the Bush administration than a paper commitment to the democratic process.