[Marxism] Statement of Free Trade Union of Iranian Workers

["Fred Feldman" <ffeldman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I don't know if this is the primary Iranian independent trade union group or
not, but its position is worth having. 
Marxist.Com is the online organ of the International Marxist Tendency
(Grant-Woods), which has small groups in a number of countries, including
Iran.
Fred Feldman    

By The Free Trade Union of Iranian Workers Tuesday, 23 June 2009

http://www.marxist.com/message-free-trade-union-iranian-workers.htm

Forty-eight days have passed since the suppression and arrests of the
workers' gathering on International Labour Day - May Day. During this time
important events have taken place and have caused widespread and amazing
changes in the social movement of the country. Here we publish a message and
a list of demands of the Free Trade Union of Iranian Workers.

Forty-eight days have passed since the suppression and arrests of the
workers' gathering on International Labour Day - May Day. During this time
important events have taken place and have caused widespread and amazing
changes in the social movement of the country.

During their televised debates the presidential election candidates accused
each other of violating the citizens' rights, embezzlement, theft,
mismanagement, and incompetence. But none of them had any objection to the
laws that have allowed the disastrous events affecting the majority of the
population. None of them had any objection to the law that takes away a
worker's right to strike, sets his wages at a quarter of the poverty line,
takes away his right to [form] organisations, allows mass lay-offs, the
signing of blank contracts and forces a one-month temporary contract on him.

May Day 2009 in Tehran, where workers have been suppressed and arrestedMay
Day 2009 in Tehran, where workers have been suppressed and arrestedOn the
issues of the freedom of speech, the freedom to dress [as you choose], and
tens and hundreds of inhuman case that today govern society, they did not
say a word, and if they did point to cases in a superficial way, every one
of them was an attempt [by the candidate] to clear himself and accuse the
other, as if his opponent has been more strict than himself. In all those
debates, clearly and in confronting each other, the candidates themselves
proved that they accept all the present laws and conditions and that their
only quarrel is on snatching power from their opponent.

Therefore, we workers, under the present conditions, when social protests
have taken the form of a mass and huge movement that has come on the scene
to achieve its demands, it is our right to turn the leaflet with the demands
of our fellow working class people, into our banner and to raise it. These
demands are as follows:

1. Immediate increase in the minimum wage to over 1 million tomans [$1010] a
month.
2. An end to temporary contracts and new forms of work contracts.
3. The disbanding of the Labour House and the Islamic Labour Councils as
government organisations in the factories and workshops, and the setting up
of shoras [councils] and other workers' organisations independent from the
government.
4. Immediate payment of workers' unpaid wages without any excuses.
5. An end to laying-off workers and payment of adequate unemployment
insurance to all unemployed workers.
6. The immediate release of all political prisoners including the workers
arrested on May Day, Jafar Azimzadeh, Gholamreza Khani, Said Yuzi, Said
Rostami, Mehdi Farahi-Shandiz, Kaveh Mozafari, Mansour Osanloo and Ebrahim
Madadi, and an end to surveillance and harassment of workers and labour
leaders.
7. The right to strike, protest, assemble and the freedom of speech and the
press are the workers' absolute right.
8. An end to sexual discrimination, child labour and the sacking of foreign
workers.

Workers! Today we have a duty to intervene, to pose our demands
independently and by relying on our own united strength, together with other
sections of society, to work towards achieving our human rights.

The Free Trade Union of Iranian Workers
18 June 2009



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