metals

The occupation began on March 26th, with the workers producing a list of 11 demands including a 50% wage increase, and the restoration of previously suspended parts of the workers welfare packages.

With a lot of rhetoric and propaganda the Chavez administration has advanced different examples of co-management which, they claim, demonstrate their desire to transform Venezuela’s relations of production. A compañero from Europe visited us recently and got to know two of the most celebrated cases: Alcasa and Invepal.

Members of the Sintracerromatoso union at the nickel mine operated by Cerro Matoso, a subsidiary of the multinational company, BHP Billiton, have begun a strike after negotiations failed to produce an agreement with the company.

Germany's main metal workers union, IG Metall, estimates that up to 10,000 workers participated in the strike on Thursday, most of whom work in the major industrial region of the Ruhr Valley. The strike affected over a dozen plants, including the ArcelorMittal factory in Bremen, where 1,500 workers succeeded in shutting down the plant for the day.

Workers at the Lihir gold mine in Papua New Guinea walked out five days ago over a pay dispute in an unofficial action that is still unresolved. Efforts to cut a deal have stalled while managers consider Lihir's workers' demands, which include sacking the entire management of the mine. It is claimed that workers have been consistently denied the right to organise to protect their rights at work.

Operations at the Canadian-owned plant have been paralysed.

Allafrica.com reported that the strike started around 05:30 hours when morning shift miners refused to enter the mining premises, claiming they had been underpaid.

A Times reporter found the more than 100 miners gathered at about 100 metres from the main gate around 07:00 hours.

More than 9000 metal and engineering companies were affected by industrial action as 260000 workers took to the streets yesterday demanding a 10% increase for lower grade workers and 9percent for higher grade workers. Employers are offering between 7.3% and 7.8%.

The workers were originally fired towards the end of January, after a government inspection of the factory showed that 19 of the factory's 64 workers. The worker's contracts were cancelled after the inspector declared that they were using false papers.

Detailed article about a strike in Italy from 2004 to 2005 against closure of a steel plant.

Very short article on two South African metal workers strikes.

In the summer of 1766 Mexican silver miners of Real del Monte, about one hundred kilometres north of Mexico city, developed a major industrial strike without a trade union or a political ideology to sustain them. It was the first strike in the history of Mexican labour and the first strike in North America

While the strike has ended, there are reasons to believe that this could be the first act in an unfolding drama that could challenge Mexican employers, the corrupt “official” unions, and the conservative Mexican government. Stay in your seats, the play has only begun.

By Dan La Botz

Ngo Van Xuhat Born 1913, Vietnam, died 2005, France

Ngo Van Xuhat , author of The Saigon Commune, started his political career as a Trotskyist but by the end of his life had developed libertarian analyses.

Police said the villagers had staged a dharna* in front of the company’s main gate on December 27, 2005, asking the company to install an electrostatic precipitator to control air pollution caused by the exhaust gas of the plant.

An account by a striking miner and Wobbly (Industrial Workers of the World member) who was deported with 1,185 other strikers to New Mexico by armed vigilantes hired by copper bosses to defeat the strike

The Robber Baron Andrew Carnegie precipitated the Homestead Strike of 1892 with his attack against the standard of living of the workers and his bid to break the union representing the highest skilled workers. Carnegie announced his intention to impose an 18 percent pay cut and issued a statement saying that the real issue was whether the Homestead steel workers would be union or non-union.