The strike of 16 June has sharpened the polarisation a bit more. The de facto legitimate struggle carried out by the shipyard workers and their union is based on class unionism, and shows the working class the way to follow in the struggle for achieving their rights and fighting against neo-liberal attacks.
On 16 June, an important strike was realised at the shipyards’ zone of Tuzla, Istanbul that resulted in 60% of the production stopped. Although this strike lasted for one day, it had quite a broad impact. The influence and power of the strike had made itself feel yet before 16 June and set the strike on the agenda of the working class as well as of the bosses-government-police front. The strike of 16 June highly increased the polarisation of society. It displayed the unions and organisations taking part in the militant struggle within the ranks of the working class as well as those in the swamp of union bureaucracy and reformism.
In the following you will find some information on the shipyards’ zone in order to understand the struggle carried out at Tuzla shipyards:
According to state figures, 48 of the 62 shipyards in Turkey are located at Tuzla shipyards´ zone. Altogether 563 outsourcing companies are active in this region which has the 95% of the private shipbuilding sector as well as of the repairing industry. Tuzla shipyards’ zone has grown rapidly since 2001 and reached rank 5 in the world in the shipyards’ sector. It has reached an export volume of 2,5 billion USD. It is supposed that there are 40.000 workers in fact working at these shipyards, while the number of registered workers is 5.300 at the main companies and 8800 at the subcontract firms.
Tuzla shipyards’ zone is a place where slavery working conditions are ahead, where there is no security precautions are taken for work, and work-related accidents leading to the death of the workers happen every day. These “murders” are not registered officially and therefore not made a discussion point. 5.800 work accidents happened only in 2006. However, the number of workers who died following work-related accidents registered by the union is 98 so far. As for an example of the workers’ working and living conditions; when the workers leave their homes in the morning, they usually say goodbye to their families doubting if they would return.
While the bosses of the shipyards’ zone are organised at GIS-BIR, the great majority of the workers is not organised. The fate of the shipyards’ zone, where workers face working without insurance and the right of being organised within a union, where no security precautions are taken and which is a centre of cheap work labour, has started to change with the struggle started by the union
Limter-Is .
Under the leadership of Limter-Is that carries out its struggle following the line of class unionism, the shipyard workers went on strike for two days on 27-28 February 2008 and showed that the conditions at their work place can only be changed through the legitimized struggle in practice. The bosses’ organisation that refused to respect and care about the union until then had to start to do so after the strike. The conscious and experience created by the strike on 27-28 February has opened the way for the workers to join the struggle for their rights.
Limter-Is that defends the right of the shipyard workers has led a hard struggle against slavery working conditions for 16 years. The union has continued with its line by paying a high price until now. In 1999, comrade Suleyman Yeter, of the executive committee of the union and a communist worker leader was killed through torture. Union leaders and members have been arrested many times, were punched and imprisoned. Whenever they were resisting, they had to face the shipyard bosses, the police and state courts. However, the strike of 16 June also shows that they are determinedly continuing with their work by overcoming all obstacles.
The strike of 16 June is an important achievement in the struggle of the shipyard workers. The strike had been put on the agenda of many groups of society by actions and activities organised before. Because the work-related accidents were always made a topic on the agenda of the public by the union, the strike was considered as legitimized and received broad support. Dozens of unions, hundreds of intellectuals, writers, academicians and artists supported the strike. The student youth left the campuses in masses to come to the shipyards’ zone. With the workers of other sectors being on strike and solidarising themselves with the shipyard workers as well as the solidarity actions for the shipyard workers’ strike in many cities of Turkey and Northern Kurdistan made Tuzla the place where the working class’ heart is beating. The solidarity movement exceeded the borders of Turkey and Northern Kurdistan and was active on international level.
Before the strike, the bosses had struggled to break the strike: They had threatened the workers with dismissal, they had worked together with the police to take workers to their work place, and the bourgeois media had only reported negatively in its news on the strike. Despite of these and many other factors, many workers did not show up for work and supported the strike. However, an important number of workers did not go on the streets to actively support the strike because of the reasons mentioned above. This fact shows that the conscious of the workers as well as their organisation are still limited.
The strike on 16 June made the bosses and the government become active. One result of the strike’s impact is TOBB (Union of Chambers and Stock Exchange of Turkey) as the highest employer organisation intervening and organising a meeting, which was then cancelled by
GISBIR that did not want to sit down at the same table with Limter-Is. The bosses’ organisation, that did not want Limter-Is sitting down at the table with them before the strike, had to accept the union taking part in a big meeting after the strike.
Due to the impact of the strike on 16 June, Prime Minister Erdogan even became active and organised a meeting together with the ministers and employers. Erdogan, who did not call Limter-Is to participate, said after the strike that from now on precautions will be taken against Limter-Is’ actions and openly showed Limter-Is as target.
The strike of 16 June has sharpened the polarisation a bit more. The de facto legitimate struggle carried out by the shipyard workers and their union is based on class unionism, and shows the working class the way to follow in the struggle for achieving their rights and fighting against neo-liberal attacks. The precautions Erdogan talked about after the meeting with the bosses is a sign for the attacks to increase on the shipyard workers and the union Limter-Is representing the working class and sectors leading a militant struggle. The shipyard bosses and Limter-Is stated that this kind of threats will not achieve anything and that they will continue with their struggle based on the legitimate struggle line. What will develop the struggle of the working class are the workers of other sectors fighting on the basis of the legitimate struggle line and counting any attack on the shipyard workers as against themselves so that they will develop a common class stance.
