The IMF, EMF, IG-METALL, FIOM and CCMB were international organizations among those who were represented in the meeting. President of DISK/Turkish Confederation of Progressive Workers’ Unions, an Executive Committee member of KESK (Turkish Confederation of Public Employees), a representative from MESS-Metal Employers’ Union, a high level representative from ILO Representation in Ankara, academicians from labour economy departments of some universities and journalists from press and media were among some other guests of our event.
The most appreciated thing in the event was the format of the event that it was a first in our country . Indeed, it was a first in our country that the workers, the main collocutors of violations from different workplaces where violations mostly happened had also chances to take the floor and express what they face when they deal with trade union activities.

Some of the demands raised by president Adnan Serdaroglu in his opening speech were as follows:

- All waged laborers and people who have to work in order to survive must have the right to establish a trade union and being member of trade unions freely.

- All regulations which allow the state and capital to make direct or indirect interventions on the internal affairs of trade unions and give the possibility to control trade unions must be restricted.
- There should not be any restrictions on the organization form and type of trade unions, functioning, structuring and organs must be determined by the statute of trade unions.

- The public notary condition on the membership and resignation should be removed.

- The thresholds on country (10%) and work place (50%) levels should be removed and trade unions should be able to act for their members.

- Regarding collective agreements on plant level the principle of proportional representation of the unions should apply; competent unions should be determined by referendum in the case of objection. If objection is not the case, concerned union should gain competency according to notification made by workers.

- Any kind of regulations which prevent the right of strike and link it to the process of collective bargaining must be removed and strike should be accepted as a right that all workers can enjoy.
We don’t want authorities do too many things.

We only want universal rights be respected as they are essential parts of humanity family.
We are ashamed that these rights are still not recognized and working people in our country can not enjoy with them.

In the light of facts expressed by the victims of violations, the arguments such as social dialogue or democratic rights referred by MESS representative remained highly sceptical and received criticisms not only from the victims but also from international delegates and scientists.

Ron Blum from the IMF, pointed out the importance of international framework agreements and cooperation between international federations on the vialotions of labour rights. Hardy Koch from the EMF, underlined the rights guaranteed by European laws and regulations. Alessandra Mecozzi from FIOM reminded thousands of workers who were dismissed in October 1998 only for they wanted to become member in Birlesik Metal and she also pointed out the need for a more concrete strategy for international solidarity. Klaus Priegnitz from IG Metal briefly expressed how IG Metal reacted against dismissals in two different cases of organizing: Grammar and ZF Lemforder. Priegnitz also argued that there was a huge gap between the facts told by victims and wishes expressed by MESS representative. Luc Triangle from CCMB, made a presentation on the victory in organizing workers in BOSAL and gave very important clues for success in international solidarity actions. Triangle asked from MESS representative not to object the authority licence which will be given to Birlesik Metal Union by Labour Ministery.

There were few basic reasons to organize this event particularly in May: First, the new draft on trade union law is expected to be passed in the Turkish Parliement. Since very minor changes made in this draft do not alter the anti-union logic, we aimed to increase public awareness and pressures on government through press and media in order to have a better draft . Therefore this workshop was a success as it took place in several daily newspapers on 25th and 26th May. Moreover, we also aimed to organize it before ILO Conference in June and a high level ILO representative in Ankara attended in the meeting. We strongly believe that our demands will be forwarded to competent bodies in the ILO. We aimed to express violations of trade union rights through the real witnesses, dismissed workers and international unions to the concerned parties of violations like government officials, ILO representatives and most basically to the employers.

We’d like repeat our gratitudes to all sister organizations who provided great help to us in preparation process of this workshop.

Link to the EMF Solidarity webpage.