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March 11, 2016

 

Tema Port Workers on sit down strike
Masahudu Ankiilu Kunateh, Ghanadot


Accra, June 1, Ghanadot - Following the fiasco of the management of the company to dutifully organise a referendum to determine whether the Maritime and Dock Workers Union (MDU) or the National Union of Harbour Employees (NUHEM) has mandate of the workers, Workers of the Ghana Dock Labour Company Limited (GDLC) at the Tema Port have embarked on a sit down strike.


According to the General Secretary of NUHEM, Mr. J. J. Jebuni the workers have decided not to go to work until they have been allowed to exercise their franchise as to which union they want to belong to.

He explained that the action of the workers numbering over 2,679 should not be seen as a kind of demonstration or strike action since they are prepared to go back to work as soon as they are allowed to vote.

Ghanadot gathered that the referendum was to enable the acting Chief Labour Officer, Ms. Elizabeth Hagan to make an informed decision as to which of the two unions could hold the Collective Bargaining Certificate to bargain on behalf of the workers.


The workers, became infuriated on that fateful morning when after 10:00am , neither officials of the Electoral Commission (EC) or GDLC had turned up to allow the referendum to take place and therefore decided not to go back to work, saying “No referendum, no work”.


Alhough, the workers did not cause any destruction of property or life, a joint police from the Tema Regional Police Command and the Police Headquarters was called to ensure that there was law and order and also to urge the workers go back to work.

The police personnel at the scene used water cannons, rubber bullets, tear gas and even live bullets to disperse the crowd leading to some of the workers sustaining various degrees of injury while others were apprehended by the police and manhandled.

The police personnel had cordoned the premises of the GDLC to prevent the workers from entering the premises excerpt for those who were prepared to go back to work.

Investigations reaching Ghanadot from the GDLC show that workers of the company for many years have been with the MDU , but decided over a year ago that they no longer wish to be with them, but rather they wanted to join NUHEM, because the MDU did not have their interest at heart.

This brought about acrimonies between the workers and the management and so the issue had to be sent to the office of the Chief Labour Officer at the Labour Department for an amicable settlement.

Therefore after series of meetings, it was agreed that a referendum be conducted to allow the workers to determine which of the two unions they want to join.

In a letter dated April 1, 2008 , signed by the acting Chief Labour Officer and copied to the two workers unions, Ms Elisabeth called for the conduct of the referendum to “Enable me make an informed decision as to the Union which should hold the Collective Bargaining Certificate on behalf of the workers”.

However, the executives of MDU cautioned the Labour department on its action of authorizing the referendum.  Their reason was that they did not understand why the intended referendum was to take place because they had no information on the resignation of members from their union.

They stated in a letter dated April 3, 2008 and signed by the general secretary of the Union , K. Owusu Afriyie that the call for the referendum has the tendency to undermine their union as well as to pitch one union against the other and called on Ms Elisabeth to ensure the continuous unionization of all the casual workers at GDLC under MDU , because they have been under them since the inception of the company.

The acting Chief Labour Officer wrote back to MDU to explain the rationale behind the referendum saying that where two or more workers union lay claims to majority of workers in a given company, her outfit in accordance with the Labour Act, 2003 (Act 651) had always conducted referendum to determine who has the majority.

After series of meetings and correspondences, the acting Chief Labour Officer ordered for the exercise to be conducted last Thursday, May 28, 2009 at the GDLC premises.

On Thursday last week however, the workers turned up as early as 5:00am to exercise their franchise but no official from either GDLC or the EC turned up, neither did the workers receive any notification as to whether the exercise had been postponed or cancelled.


And therefore after waiting for quite a long time, they decided not to work if they were not allowed to vote and that was when the police were called in to intimidate the workers.


Ghanadot

 

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