Joint Statement: Full Solidarity with the Cement Workers Facing Trial… Your Struggle is Our Struggle

Statement by the Revolutionary Socialists

We, the undersigned, express our profound shock and astonishment at the verdict issued on Sunday, June 4, sentencing 32 workers from the Tora Cement Company to three years in prison on charges of thuggery and assaulting public officials. No incriminating evidence was presented, and the trial—lasting no more than 15 days from the workers’ arrest to the issuance of the verdict—was clearly biased. The judge openly declared his belief in the “prohibition and criminalization” of sit-ins and strikes, thus stripping the trial of the standards for a fair and just trial.

As if the government wasn’t already satisfied with the workers enduring the deterioration of their economic and social conditions—supposedly a result of what it claims to be economic reforms, where only the poor pay the price through increased poverty, rising prices, and worsening living conditions—it now acts with severe cruelty and determination to silence every labor voice raised in demand of their trampled rights. These workers face either imprisonment, job dismissal, or homelessness.

Such crimes, among others, have once again placed Egypt—now for the fourth time—on the International Labour Organization’s blacklist, which includes the worst violators of labor and union rights globally, for breaching international conventions that regulate these matters.

The undersigned affirm the legitimacy of the cement workers’ struggle, who resisted attempts to make them jobless by staging a 55-day sit-in at their company. After many years of dedicated service, they have the right to permanent employment. Furthermore, labor supply companies—which the government seeks to legitimize under the new labor law—must be abolished. These companies exploit the sweat of workers, deny them insurance protection, and exclude them from profit-sharing.

We declare our full solidarity with the imprisoned cement workers and pledge to use all peaceful means to secure their release, in defiance of an authoritarian regime that adopts policies impoverishing millions of Egyptians while suppressing their protests.

We call on human rights, labor, and union organizations in Egypt and around the world to show their solidarity with the workers, whose first appeal hearing is scheduled for June 18.
The undersigned emphasize that strikes and sit-ins are legitimate rights of the working class in response to rising prices, increasing poverty, and exploitation. These rights were won by Egyptian workers through long struggles and are protected by international conventions that Egypt has signed, as well as by the 2014 Constitution.

Striking is a Right
Permanent Employment is a Right
No to Labor Supply Companies
Freedom for the Cement Workers
Signatories:
First: Political Parties
• Bread and Freedom Party
• Popular Socialist Alliance Party
• Karama Movement
• Strong Egypt Party
• Constitution Party
• Moheb Abboud, Secretary of Labor and Farmers, Social Democratic Party
Second: Movements
• Revolutionary Socialists
• April 6 Youth Movement
• April 6 Democratic Front
• January Socialist Movement
• Strong Egypt Students Movement
• Journalists and Freedoms Defense Front
• The Legal Cooperative for Workers’ Awareness Support
Third: Unions
• General Union of Workers in Tourism
• Egyptian Union of Petroleum Workers
• Rashad Kamal, President of the Independent Suez Trade Union Federation
Fourth: NGOs
• El Nadeem Center for Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence and Torture
• Arab Network for Human Rights Information
• Damiir Egypt (Committee for the Defense of the Oppressed)
• Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression