On Tuesday, December 17, the House of Representatives approved a spending package that increases annual funding for the National Endowment for Democracy from $180 million to $300 million. The Senate approved the measure on December 19 and it was signed into law by President Trump on Friday, December 20.
“We thank the Congress and welcome this robust endorsement of the NED’s mission of advancing democracy around the world,” said NED President Carl Gershman. “This work is more critical than ever before as we confront dangerous challenges to democracy, including the rise of authoritarian states like China and Russia that are undermining democratic norms and values around the world; as well as opportunities for progress in transitional countries like Ethiopia and Sudan.”
The NED is a bipartisan, non-governmental grant-making organization with the single mission of advancing democracy around the world. Governed by an independent board of directors, NED provides support to over 1,500 non-governmental organizations annually in more than 90 countries. These groups are working to protect and advance democratic values, institutions, and processes, including credible and fair elections, independent trade unions, a robust private sector, independent media, and groups that defend human rights and the rule of law. NED’s four core institutes share the expertise of America’s civil society with grassroots partners around the world who are working to build stable democratic societies.
“Congressional support for democracy assistance is a reflection of U.S. values and national interest – a fourth “d” alongside diplomacy, defense, and development,” said NDI President Derek Mitchell. “We are committed to ensuring sound stewardship of taxpayer dollars in support of democracy abroad, and to promote both a more peaceful, stable, and just world, and more prosperous and secure America.”
IRI President Daniel Twining noted that the American people have also shown support for the advance of democratic values abroad. “Polling shows the American public believes supporting political freedom in the world is the right thing to do. Investing in strengthening democratic leaders and institutions overseas enables our partners to push back against malign influence by authoritarian powers like China and Russia, reduces the conflict and lawlessness that drive mass migration, and creates a more safe, stable and prosperous world for Americans.”
The importance of supporting the values of freedom and democracy extends beyond elections, as the leaders of NED’s business and labor institutes remarked: “The global competitiveness of values and norms extends to the economic sector, with the surging influence of authoritarian capital in markets across the globe, which threatens the competitiveness of American firms,” said CIPE Executive Director Andrew Wilson.
Solidarity Center Executive Director Shawna Bader-Blau emphasized that, “democracy and the ability to exercise one’s basic human rights—including to demand a safer workplace or a more responsive government—are inextricably linked. As more people live in countries where inequality is on the rise and basic rights are eroding, the work to strengthen democracy everywhere is even more urgent.”
Gershman highlighted that NED grants provide critical financial and moral support: “When NED and its institutes provide sustained support for the innovative and often courageous efforts of activists on the frontlines of democratic change, it sends the important message of American solidarity with the struggles around the world for democracy and human rights. With increased resources, NED and its institutes will be able to further bolster the work of activists who are our natural allies, while also countering authoritarian countries that threaten our security and democratic way of life.”
Delegates to the International Trade Union Confederation–Africa (ITUC-Africa) last week passed a resolution drafted by women union leaders that will help the organization’s 101 affiliates address gender-based violence and harassment in the world of work, including pressing African governments to ratify International Labor Organization (ILO) Convention 190.
Passed in June, Convention 190 is a new global treaty to prevent and address violence and harassment in the world of work that includes gender-based violence and harassment.
Delegates from more than 47 African countriesgathered in the Nigerian capital of Abuja for the 4th Ordinary Congress of the ITUC-Africa’s Regional Organization November 21 and 22. Held every four years, the Congress sets labor’s priorities and direction on behalf of Africa’s working people, both internally and in its dealings with governments and employers.
“The trade union movement in Africa has tremendous power to influence the future not only of the continent but the world,” said AFL-CIO Vice President Tefere Gebre, speaking to delegates.
Some 45 women leaders of unions from across the continent—many of whom have long been engaged in a global campaign to end gender-based violence and harassment at work—presented their recommendations to the full Congress, which the ITUC-Africa leadership formally adopted.
The resolution includes the following recommendations for African unions and ITUC-Africa:
Women trade union leaders participate in worker negotiations with employers, so gender-based violence and harassment at work is prioritized
Going forward, negotiated agreements with employers include language that explicitly addresses gender-based violence and harassment at work
ITUC-Africa provide support for union affiliates that are lobbying their governments to adopt Convention 190.
The Solidarity Center is deeply saddened by the death of our colleague and friend, Lyuba Frenkel, senior program officer for Europe and Central Asia, who succumbed July 30 after a brave battle with brain cancer.
Over Lyuba’s 26-year career with the Solidarity Center, she was instrumental in designing, supporting and monitoring projects that bolstered freedom of association throughout Eastern Europe, and for several years also in Southeast Asia. She built close cooperation with local partners, with a focus on collective bargaining, grievance representation, labor laws, trade union organizing, dispute resolution, migration and worker rights. Throughout her successful career, Lyuba never missed an opportunity to convince workers their lives can be better when they join in a union to fight for their interests together.
“A quiet person with a passion for the work, Lyuba helped thousands of workers understand and exercise their rights,” said Rudy Porter, Solidarity Center regional program director, Europe and Central Asia. “She will be deeply missed, both within the Solidarity Center and among the dozens of partner organizations around the globe with which she had such close ties.”
Lyuba was a tireless defender of those who suffered persecution because of their participation in independent unions, and almost daily sought new ways to push their cases to the forefront of public attention. And as a longtime advocate for women’s leadership to drive economic justice and social protection for all, Lyuba was an important catalyst for the Solidarity Center’s gender work today. She was especially involved in building union campaigns in Eastern Europe to end gender-based violence in the workplace.
“In her 26 years with the Solidarity Center, Lyuba stood firmly by people engaged in some of the world’s most consequential struggles for worker rights and human dignity. She did so with integrity and generosity, born of her deep commitment to justice. Lyuba was respected, liked and admired by everyone she worked with, and we will miss her,” said Shawna Bader-Blau, Solidarity Center executive director.
Lyuba is survived by her mother and daughter.
A graveside memorial service will take place at 1 p.m. Sunday, August 4, at the Garden of Remembrance Memorial Park, 14321 Comus Rd., Clarksburg, Maryland.
From Haiti to Kenya, Nepal and Palestine, hundreds of thousands of workers and their families celebrated International Workers Day last week, honoring the dignity of work and the accomplishments of the labor movement in defending human rights, job stability, fair wages and safe workplaces. Together, workers and their unions are demonstrating their commitment to sustaining and improving worker lives.
Click here for our photo essay of May Day 2019 events by Solidarity Center allies around the globe.
The U.S.-based Amalgamated Bank has selected the Solidarity Center as one of its featured nonprofits in an online contest. The organization that receives the most votes will receive up to $5,000 and be recognized as a prominent social justice organization making change for workers.
The Amalgamated Bank campaign is part of “#GivingTuesday,” an annual event that takes place on the Tuesday following Thanksgiving. Amalgamated Bank’s contest is designed to encourage bank customers and others to give to organizations that inspire them and raise awareness about social-justice groups that deserve support. The Amalgamated Bank #VoteToGive contest is open anyone in the United States.
#VoteToGive!
Amalgamated Bank is the largest union-owned bank and one of the only unionized banks in the United States. Founded in 1923 by the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, Amalgamated Bank today is a leading philanthropic organization for social change and worker justice. The contest goes out to the broader labor, pro-labor and progressive community including Amalgamate’s clients as well, and has the potential to introduce us to many unions and allies in the United States.
If you are on social media, please retweet and “like” and on Twitter, and like and share our Facebook posts to help spread the word. Use the hashtag #VoteToGive.
In Colombia, the national union of food workers, SINTRAIMAGRA, is denouncing the murder of one of its union leaders and is asking the government to identify, capture and prosecute those who perpetrated the crime.
Shortly before he died, Edilberto Niño Cristancho told authorities he was stabbed 18 times by two assailants as he boarded a taxi November 4 in Villavicencio.
Colombian palm oil union leader Edilberto Nicon Cristancho was murdered this month, one of more than a dozen union leaders killed this year. Credit: SINTRAIMAGRA
Niño Cristancho was leading an organizing and formalization campaign for palm oil workers in the country’s fertile eastern plains together with the Central Unitaria de Trabajadores (CUT).
Palm oil workers in Colombia and around the world are part of a global supply chain that often exploits human labor to feed the world’s growing demand for household products and cosmetics. Palm oil workers are forced to work long hours in hazardous conditions, without adequate safety equipment and unprotected from contact with chemicals like paraquat, an acutely toxic chemical.
With CUT, Niño Cristancho sought to ensure palm companies in the region fully complied with workers’ constitutional and legal rights, as well as with International Labor Organization conventions, such as the right to form unions and bargain contracts.
For decades, Colombia was the most dangerous country for union leaders and members, with thousands of activists murdered over the past 20 years, and it remains among the five worst countries for worker rights, according to the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) 2018 Global Rights Index. Perpetrators of murders and attacks are rarely punished.
Although Colombia’s overall homicide rate dropped after a 2016 peace agreement between the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), worker rights activists are now facing a worsening security environment. Between January 1 and August 27, 14 union members were murdered, six were physically attacked and 134 threatened with violence, according to the Escuela Nacional Sindica Information Database of Human Rights.
Social activists, indigenous leaders and environmentalists also are being murdered in greater numbers. Nearly 200 community leaders were killed in 2018.
Unions are concerned that recent statements by the government linking social protests to armed groups encourages violence, and SINTRAIMAGRA is asking the government to provide security guarantees to union members and union leaders.
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