The Centre for Trade Unions and Workers’ Services expressed solidarity with the workers of the Chemical Industries Development Company (CID) after the board of directors decided to freeze the work.
The CID board’s decision came after the workers announced a strike protesting the low profit ratio allotted to the workers, as the company’s general assembly decided on 4 October to disburse two months’ profits instead of six months. The workers said that the decision contradicts the fact that the company achieved high profits this year. CTUWS said that the administration intimidated the workers with the demonstration law, then decided to close the company. “The decision is in line with the business sector ministry’s anti-labour policy,” said CTUWS in a press statement.
The statement added that the ministry, aside from throwing the responsibility of its maladministration policies on the workers, forged law 185 of 2020 in order to deprive the workers of their rights. The law was passed by the puppet parliament without discussing it with workers’ representatives and the ministry intimidated the workers of the business sector (state-owned companies) by threatening to liquidate any company if its workers protested the law. MP Ahmed Ashour requested briefing from the business sector minister, Hesham Tawfik, regarding the strike and the suspension of the ampoules facility in the company, which cost over EGP 70 million, and was suspended after opening without a clear cause.
The Social Democratic Party, Tagamo’ Party, and the Popular Alliance Party, denounced the freezing decision, and the president of Tagamo’, Sayed Abdel Aal, demanded PM Moustafa Madbouly investigate the statement issued by the business sector minister, which attacked the workers. Abdel Aal emphasised that the workers have never resorted to sabotage and they are practicing their right to strike, while it is the administration who closed the factory and suspended production.
