Seminar told no efforts made
since November 2016 when around 40 workers had died in oil tanker explosion
Despite the loss of almost
40 lives of workers at the Gadani ship-breaking yard since November 2016, no
efforts have been made by the state or the owners to improve the conditions.
This was stated by Nasser
Mansoor, general secretary of the Pakistan National Trades Unions Federation
(PNTUF), while addressing a seminar at the Irtiqa Institute of Social Sciences
on Saturday evening.
Departments like the police
and the environment took bribes from the owners to do their bidding against the
labourers, he alleged.
The capitalist owners, he
said, spent Rs4million on having the genuine union of the workers
De-registered. “Now we have
a union but our collective bargaining is not recognised.”
Mansoor said there was total
blockage of news of accidents that occurred and things were just hushed up.
“There’s no proper sanitary
system for the workers, no proper messing. A plate of Daal which may be selling
for Rs60 in town sells for Rs90 at Gadani. A Roti which sells for Rs5 in town
is likely to cost Rs10 there.
Factories are serving as
slaughter houses.”
Industrialists and
politician industrialists were not playing the government-mandated minimum wage
of Rs14,000 a month to their workers, despite the fact that these politicians
were constantly shedding crocodile’s tears for the workers.
He said that at the time of
the recent accidents, no government functionary or politician came to enquire
after the welfare of the workers. The only person who came with 60 vehicles and
generous aid was the late Abdul Sattar Edhi’s son, Faisal Edhi.
The way ship-breaking was
being carried out, without any set code, harmful substances were being dumped
into the sea polluting marine life, which was such an important source of food
and protein, he said.
“It is the people who have
to get together against this order and change the narrative,” he said.
Mansoor said all the
oppressed and the working classes would have to unite to change the unjust
order. He said that there was a deliberate attempt to shut Pakistan Steel to
pander to the interests of the steel importers and a section of the
bureaucracy. “If the state and the capitalists don’t go by what they have
written, sooner or later there’s sure to be a mighty conflagration.”
Mansoor’s talk was preceded
by the screening of a movie which showed four case studies of the state of
workers after some of those countries went capitalist and workers were taken
for a ride. The four case studies were those of Ukraine, Indonesia, Gadani
Ship-breaking Works and China.
The movie showed the
conditions of the mine workers in Ukraine after independence and the end of the
socialist era and China after the country went avowedly capitalist. The
condition of Chinese workers is depicted as horrible under capitalism.
Source:
the news. 21 May 2017
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