Israel's Ashdod port wildcat strike ends

A two-day wildcat strike in defiance of bosses and unions at the Ashdod port ended on Friday with a return to work.

Submitted by Steven. on February 6, 2007

The action was seemingly a mirror of a similar struggle at the port reported on libcom.org last year.

Port2port.com reported that the port workers committee decided at midnight on Tuesday 30 January to exercise a labor dispute declared three weeks ago. The strike ended 2 days later and the workers reurned to work on Friday

Port workers at the Ashdod Port extended last Wednesday disruptions to service to a full wildcat stoppage over pay demands in defiance of bosses and unions. Port workers protest several aspects of their workers' agreement, ignoring an agreement not to strike for five years which was part of the reforms instituted at the country's ports.
The port workers committee decided at midnight on Tuesday to exercise a labor dispute declared three weeks ago. The strike ended 2 days later and the workers reurned to work on Friday.

Ashdod Port Company Ltd. chairperson Iris Stark said last week that "The workers union is opposed to the application of a number of chapters in the workers' agreement, which they signed a number of years ago".

Ashdod Port Company CEO Shuki Sagis added that ” the general strike had disrupted the port’s activity. And constituted a gross violation of the agreements the workers committee had signed, and that it was totally unreasonable and out of line.

The economic department of Federation of Israeli Chambers of Commerce estimated at the end of last week that the business community lost NIS 50 million in the first day of the strike and accused the workers of using the strike as a political means of weakening the management to bring the port to the same situation it was in before the port reforms.

Israelnationalnews.com reported during the strike that the workers' committee also was also angry over the management's hiring of a former aide to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as a consultant to mediate labor problems, and that and the port authority considered taking legal steps to try to issue emergency orders to resume activity.

More information
- Dockworker's action in Eilat, Israel forums discussion - January 2007
- Israel: Ashdod Port shut down by wildcat strike - March 2006

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