Defend Egyptian Workers!

July 14, 2016
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Egypt, INTERNATIONAL, International Labor Defense, Labor Struggles, MENA, Uncategorized
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Down with Egyptian State Repression!

For International Labor Solidarity with Alexandria Shipyard Workers!

On May 22^nd and 23^rd, the majority of the 2,500 workers at the Alexandria Shipyard Company engaged in a sit-in to protest working conditions. Now 26 “strikers” face charges at the hands of the Egyptian government of al-Sisi. The strongman al-Sisi, you will recall, has replaced Hosni Mubarak, ousted by the SCAF (Supreme Council of the Armed Forces) in 2013. Since 1952 the SCAF, has played a direct role, sometimes ruling from behind the scenes as in the period of the Morsi presidency. Their role has been to assure the suppression of the national democratic revolution through control of the workers, sometimes by direct violence or more often with the the anti-strike laws.

Today the 26 Egyptian civilian workers face a military court on charges of “instigating strikes.” The international working class needs to come to the defense of our Egyptian class sisters and brothers. The so-called strike was actually a protest, a sit-in, “…to demand payment of the national monthly minimum wage of LE1,200 per month, overdue profit-shares, annual Ramadan bonuses and health insurance coverage…,”[1] that did not even shut down or disrupt operations. It was actually the lockout of the workers on May 24th by the company, backed up by the fist of the Egyptian military that did this.

The workers face up to a year in prison along with possible fines under Article 124 of Egypt’s Penal Code. Their lawyer, Mohamed Awad of the Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights (ECESR) stated “they did not engage in any form of strike action, not even a partial strike or a slowdown.” Awad stated “If anybody is obstructing the company’s operations, it is the company’s administration, which continues to lockout its workers…[under 2014 Constitution, ed.] civilians shall not stand trial before military courts except for crimes that constitute a direct assault on military installations, the Armed Forces, its camps or all else under their authority… including military factories.”

In addition to repression against militant Egyptian workers, student protesters have been beaten and tortured into giving false confessions. Nineteen-year old student Abdel Baseer Abdel Raouf is facing execution, while students Omar Mohamed and Sohaib Saad have been given 25 year sentences by a military court.[2] The regime has charged over 160 students in military courts in the last 2 years after declaring universities to be “military institutions.” According to Human Rights Watch, as of April, 2016, 7420 Egyptian civilians have been prosecuted since in the military courts since al Sisi’s expansion of their social role in October, 2014. “In May 2015, six men were hanged following verdicts handed down by a military court in August 2014, despite evidence that some had been in detention at the time of their alleged crimes.”[3]

The Egyptian state has a history of conducting military tribunals to quash labor and social struggle. In 1952, early in the Nasser era, 567 striking textile workers at the privately owned Misr Spinning and Weaving Company in Kafr al-Dawwar were arrested and 29 tried by a military court for striking and instigating riots. Eleven were sentenced to long prison terms and two sentenced to death by hanging, with no appeal. In recent years, military prosecutions have been invoked also. In 2010, workers protesting safety conditions at Helwan Engineering Industries Company protesting safety conditions as well as workers in Petroject in 2011, faced military trials under anti-labor laws.[4]

The military police state of al-Sisi is a regime that the U.S. government could love and does love. As militant workers are being prosecuted in Egypt, 85 members of the House of Representatives have called for a total ban on immigration of refugees! In November of 2013, Secretary of State John Kerry travelled to Cairo. As the New York Times reported, “In substance as well as tone, Mr. Kerry’s visit to Egypt reflected the Obama administration’s determination to work with a military leadership that ruthlessly put down protesters from the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist movement that put forth the successful candidacy of President Mohamed Morsi, who was ousted on July 3.”[5] And of course the U.S. has sent hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to the al-Sisi government, along with military aid. After the lifting of the arms freeze imposed after Morsi was removed, the blocked hardware and moneys were sent in bigger quantities. The U.S. imperialist government knows as well as the SCAF that the powerful Egyptian working class is their Achilles heel, and that labor unrest in Egypt could ignite the whole region. So we find in the 3/31 Guardian the following announcement…,

“The White House announced on Tuesday that Egypt’s Abdel Fatah al-Sisi will soon receive 12 F-16 fighter jets, replacement kits for 125 Abrams tanks, 20 Harpoon missiles and $1.3bn in annual military funding suspended…” (after 2013.)[6]

What is needed is international class struggle defense of the MENA masses, through popularizing their struggles and organizing mass protests, labor boycotts and labor political strikes to defend all the victims of capitalist state terror.

For the immediate release of and droppping all charges against the Alexandria Shipyard workers!

Free all students! Abolish the death penalty!

For workers struggle to smash anti-labor and repressive laws!

For international labor actions of in defense of Egyptian workers and students!

We print below the solidarity call from Egyptian Solidarity Initiative along with the link:

https://egyptsolidarityinitiative.org/alexshipyard/

Workers from Alexandria Shipyard are on trial in an Egyptian military court for taking strike action to demand better pay and conditions at work. They were arrested after staging a sit-in at the yard to call for payment of bonuses, permanent contracts for 36 temporary workers who should by law have already received them and to allow workers to receive promised promotions. Military police surrounded the workers who took part in the sit-in and arrested 13 of them together with a clerical worker.

What you can do:

Sign the international petition in solidarity with the Alexandria Shipyard workers here
Use our social media banner and icons to spread the message online
Pass a resolution in protest at the trial through your union branch
Read more here on how military trials are being used to rush through unjust verdicts based on ‘evidence’ obtained through torture
Download a copy of our background briefing on the Egyptian workers’ movement here