In Burundi’s deepening political and human rights crisis, the government’s violent clampdown on civil society has left hundreds of people dead, jailed or disappeared, crushed free speech and independent media, and created a climate of fear where human and worker rights defenders have been forced into silence or exile.
Trade union members are among the hardest hit by the ongoing repression, which came to a head when President Pierre Nkurunziza announced a run for a third term in office last April. Leaders of the General Federation of Burundian Unions (COSYBU) currently living in Rwanda report that more than 700 union members have followed them into exile in the country. Many others are in jail or in hiding in Burundi. Still others have fled to other neighboring countries, leaving them largely out of touch with their organizations. Meanwhile, the Burundi government has closed the bank accounts of unions, hindering their ability to advocate for worker rights or support their members.
At a recent meeting in Kigali, Rwanda, the Solidarity Center met with dozens of exiled union members and leaders and representatives of nongovernmental organizations who told stories of fear and threats, economic intimidation and a long-term campaign to quiet dissent that preceded the protests of last spring.
“Teachers in Burundi have been one of the most oppressed categories of workers,” said a *member of the union for secondary school teachers, National Council of Personnel in Secondary Education (CONAPES), at the meeting. He said teachers had taken to the streets to protest unequal salaries among government workers prior to the announcement of the third term. However, “once you raised your voice for teachers’ rights, you were branded as against the government, arrested and put in jail.”
Most of the union’s leaders, he said, have been “chased out of their jobs and have had to flee the country.” He added, “Today, our union is dead. People are forced to keep silent.”
Market vendors relate similar tales. Members of the Merchants General Union (SYGECO) say they were systematically targeted with economic pressure, including usurious interest rates when they sought loans for their businesses, confiscation of their goods and onerous and sometimes arbitrary taxes. They, too, had organized protests against such discriminatory practices prior to the political unrest of 2015, including demands that the central market, which burned under mysterious circumstances in 2013, be rebuilt.
“One of the most depressing experiences was the burning of the market. It was our life,” said a SYGECO member who had sold fabric from her stall. “We tried to rebuild, but the government chased us everywhere we went,” adding that some 15 suburban markets where vendors tried to relocate also burned.
Now living without an income with her family in Rwanda and burdened with loans she cannot repay, the SYGECO member says the bank is going to sell her house in Burundi.
Refugees interviewed by the Solidarity Center are focused on trying to earn a living in their country of exile so they can take care of their families. Many living in Kigali are in apartments or shared quarters, though some expressed a resignation that they would move to refugee camps to save funds. They all maintain hope that they can return to a peaceful Burundi some day.
* Interviewees requested anonymity for fear of reprisals against family and friends still in Burundi.
In northeastern Nigeria, where violence has terrorized communities over the past several years, the Nigerian Union of Teachers is going beyond the difficult task of ensuring students continue to receive an education and teachers get the support they need. Union leaders and members have taken on the enormous job of providing housing, food and medical assistance to some of the thousands of teachers and their families displaced by the upheaval.
In Borno state, where the teachers’ union includes members from 2,000 schools, the union converted nearly all of its conference space into housing for those displaced by the violence. The union has provided food, clothing and shelter to some 200 union members and their families in the past year. It also has created a database of Borno-based union members killed in the insurgency. The union has tallied 388 teachers killed in Borno as of January, the majority of the more than 600 Nigerian teachers killed by suspected Boko Haram in the northeast.
“Teachers are traumatized and hence hold lessons in fear,” says Bulama Abiso, chairman of the Borno state branch of the Nigerian Union of Teachers and a former teacher and principal. “They fear suicide bombers’ infiltration of the school.” Over the past six years, Boko Haram has targeted public and private schools in northeast Nigeria, dousing the facilities with gasoline at night and setting them ablaze. Militants have also hurl homemade bombs at the concrete classrooms.
Across the country, some 19,000 teachers have been displaced, Michael Alogba-Olukoya, told the International Business Times. Alogba-Olukoya is president of the Nigeria Union of Teachers, a Solidarity Center ally.
Despite the incredible personal risk, teachers continue to their jobs in the classroom. To encourage students to return to school, Suleiman Maina, the state representative of the National Union of Teachers in Borno state, says the union is partnering with the government and other stakeholders to keep as many schools as possible open in and around the state capital.
“Our state governor has formed a high-powered committee” which includes representatives of the Nigeria Union of Teachers, principals and other stakeholders,” he says. “Out of about 1,000 primary schools, now 400 in Maiduguri and outskirts are running. It is so encouraging because now in schools, teachers are performing their jobs,” he says.
Adamu Wakawa, principal of Government Girls College in Maiduguri, the Borno state capital, leads a school that also serves as a camp for internally-displaced people. “Managing students and displaced persons is the greatest challenge that we are now facing,” he told the Nigeria Union of Teachers. “As far as I’m concerned, together with the government, effort is being made to see that students do not lose.”
In addition to raising awareness about political violence as a workplace health and safety issue for front-line workers, Abiso, who also serves as vice chairman of the Nigeria Labor Congress for Borno State Council, says the union has opened a door to conversations linking civil society with government, and is a member of key committees considering policy on resettlement of those displaced. Union leaders also are planning for opportunities for youth when the conflict ends.
Peru’s National Federation of Textile Workers is calling for immediate reinstatement of 11 textile workers who were fired less than a month after they formed a factory union in Lima. The factory, which employs more than 1,400 workers, produces high-fashion jeans for the Peruvian market.
The garment workers, many of whom had worked at the plant between nine and 20 years, created a factory union in January to improve their workplace conditions. Although most textile workers in Peru are employed on short-term contracts, the workers who lost their jobs have more stable employment because they are on indefinite contracts—yet they still risked their employment to improve working conditions. (See a video of workers protesting the company’s actions.)
After the garment workers formed the union, they say managers called union leaders into one-on-one captive audience meetings and presented each worker with a set of threats and incentives to abandon the union.
Helen Vallejos Reyes, a garment finishing worker with 20 years experience, said a manager told her to “accept the money we are offering you or we’ll see you in court.” She says managers kept her and other union members in isolation for more than five hours at the factory. Despite these pressures, Reyes says, “we all decided to not take their offer.” When the workers refused to leave the factory after the one-on-one meetings, which concluded before their shift ended, managers fired them, saying they illegally occupied the factory.
Lorena Chavera, a union organizer who has accompanied the garment workers as they sought to form a union, is hopeful about the outcome. “We spoke a lot before the workers decided to join the union,” she says. “They knew the risks they faced and they chose to go forward. I know what it feels like to lose your job for standing up, but I am confident that we will see justice for these workers because it is their constitutional right to organize and call for fair treatment.”
The National Federation of Textile Workers is working with the union to document the anti-union campaign, taking the case to government labor inspectors and the Ministry of Labor, and seeking recourse through the legal system.
Textile workers in Peru increasingly are mobilizing for their rights at work, and this new union has affiliated 22 new workers over the last couple of weeks despite employer opposition. Workers have formed two unions at factories since January, both affiliated with the National Federation of Textile Workers. (The Textile Workers union educates workers about their rights through information pamphlets and in one-on-one discussions.)
I am Rehana Begum. I got married at age 13. After marriage, my education stopped. Now I have two children. When my in-laws tried to arrange a second marriage for my husband, we left our village home in Paikgachha, Khulna district, where my husband was a day laborer, and moved to Khulna city with our children.
After a few different jobs, I started working at Modern (Seafood Industries) factory as an IQF (individually quick frozen) line operator and I worked there three years and a few months. Everything was going well. But suddenly one day we heard that management would soon terminate a large number of workers. Two days later, we saw a notice on the factory’s main gate listing the names of workers selected for layoff. Management told us this is only the first phase.
The second list was soon posted, in August 2015. We were worried, wondering when our names would appear on the list. On September 11, I heard from one of my colleagues that I was terminated, but I didn’t believe it as there was not any notice. Finally, I heard from the office that I was terminated along with 30 other workers—but management didn’t give us any written documents.
Standing Strong Together
The next day, all of us who had been terminated—about 50 workers from two factories (Bright and Modern)—met in the home of a worker. From this home meeting we decided to meet with our factory owner. We selected and assigned eight workers, four from each factory, on behalf of all workers. I was one of them and all of us got training from the Solidarity Center and learned about our rights. If we failed in the negotiations with owner, we knew we could go to the Solidarity Center for legal help.
As per our plan, we went to the factory office to meet the manager. At first, managers selected two workers out of eight and offered them all legal payments. But we were strongly united, and they could not break us. The two workers came out of the factory and shared everything with us and all the workers became angry and some of them became violent and started shouting. But we stopped them and requested that everyone stay peaceful.
Meanwhile, watching the situation, the owner suddenly changed his mind and asked all workers to come inside the factory. The owner called one worker from each factory to list demands. I said we came to you for justice, for our legal rights. We want our service benefit. We were terminated without any notice when Eid-Ul-Azha (a four-day Muslim religious holiday) is coming.
After the meeting, management assured us it will try to give all workers service benefits within one week. I received Tk. 18315 ($234). Soon, all terminated workers got their payments. It was really a great victory for us.
I have been working in Jalalabad Frozen Food Ltd. as an IQF line operator since October 2015. After working these couple of years as a shrimp processing plant worker, I now feel more confident and feel myself stronger than ever. I am also happy with my family. My husband works as a day laborer and helps me doing my job. My children are studying in school.
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