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Last Updated: Jun 30, 2009 - 8:37:18 AM |
A unique happenstance followed an ICEM workshop on Contract and Agency
Labour (CAL) in Guinea recently: the Industrial Relations manager of
Russian bauxite and steel producer RUSAL was expelled from the country
following revelations at the conference of the company’s horrid labour
practices in Guinea.
Mineworkers in Guinea, backed by leaders of the trade union
federations, provided vivid evidence on working conditions, including
child labour, at Compagnie des Bauxite de Kindla, RUSAL’s joint venture
bauxite mining concern with the government.
The testimony resulted in the government, led by Captain Moussa Dadis
Camara, to expel Anatoly Pantchenko from Guinea.
Trade unionists told how the RUSAL manager had organized a culture of
outsourcing at the mine and at RUSAL’s wholly-owned Friguia alumina
smelting plant. The company utilises some 120 outsourcing companies.
Discussion centered on how the system has aggravated poverty and
created extremely poor work conditions and salaries, leaving workers
under RUSAL’s umbrella with little means for improved living conditions.
The report was not new to the ICEM. In 2007, after street protests in
Guinea loosened the dictatorial powers of President Lansana Conté,
Rabiatou Sereh Diallo, General Secretary of the National Confederation
of Workers of Guinea (CNTG), visited the ICEM in Brussels. She and
other trade union leaders from Guinea then told how RUSAL relies
heavily on “phantom” subcontracting companies that are tied to Conté
associates.
In December 2008, following the death of Conté, Captain Moussa Dadis
Camara and a team of military officers took over the country. They
immediately forged relations with the three main trade union
federations and pledged to end corruption in the mining sector.
Since then, relations between RUSAL and the government have been
tenuous, and ICEM’s CAL workshops in May provided all the evidence
Moussa Camara needed to expel RUSAL’s top manager from Guinea. In
mid-April, workers at the Friguia refinery staged a strike, and RUSAL –
now the world’s second largest steelmaker – said the work stoppage was
instigated by the government.
The ICEM’s CAL conference agreed on a plan of action for Guinea’s
mining sector, which will see trade unions and the government push for
a review of the national mining convention, a code that became obsolete
and neglected under the corrupt Conté regime. Such a review will make
it possible to properly address outsourcing, as well as to include
guarantees on working conditions in employment contracts.
A new committee was established with the government that is tasked with
carrying out the review. The committee is composed of 13 members, two
of whom are trade union leaders.
The West African nation of Guinea holds two-thirds of the world’s
bauxite deposits. A second multinational bauxite miner, called Halco,
also operates in Guinea. But trade unionists tell the ICEM that work
conditions there are far superior to those existing at RUSAL. Halco is
an enterprise 51% owned by US-based Alcoa World Alumina and Alcan of
Canada, with the remainder owned by Guinea’s government.
Source:Ocnus.net 2009
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