Skip to content or view screen version

Workers in Ukraine Occupy Factory

zaraz.org | 03.02.2009 09:47 | Free Spaces | Workers' Movements | World

Today at 9:30 more than 300 workers occupied the administrative building of Kherson Engineering Plant. The workers demand payment of wages, nationalization of the plant without compensation to its owner and are decisively inclined to occupy the building until complete fulfillment of their demands.

Workers occupy factory in Kherson, Ukraine
Workers occupy factory in Kherson, Ukraine


During occupation no worker has injured. Factory guards did not resist seriously. The situation is controlled by yesterday elected workers council. The police has not yet appeared near the building.

At this moment the council is meeting in the former cabinet of a technical director. Leonid Nimchinov, the chair of the workers council, says that these events must be widely spread and calls workers from other plants throughout Ukraine to display solidarity and support each other. In the near future he is going to address this call to workers of Lviv Bus Plant and other factories.

The main demands of protesting workers:

- payment of wage arrears (near 4.5 million Ukrainian hryvnias);

- nationalization of the plant without compensation to its owner;

- the state-secured plant’s production distribution – high-quality farm machinery

In case of ignoring their demands workers are ready to turn to the toughest forms of protest.

Background: on February 2, 300 workers of Kherson Engineering Plant started protest action against non-payment of wages since September 2008 and actual destruction of the plant by its owners. During one of the previous meetings with the workers Ms. Pugacheva, the alternate director, said that the owners were not going to save the plant. “Why did you stick to this plant so much?” she said. The workers hold a meeting near the entrance and elected 5 representatives to the Workers Council and its chair Aleksey Nimchinov who will lead the future struggle and negotiate on behalf of the workers.

zaraz.org
- e-mail: chapeye@gmail.com
- Homepage: http://zaraz.org

Comments

Hide 1 hidden comment or hide all comments

Hidden Comment

This posting has been hidden because it breaches the Indymedia UK (IMC UK) Editorial Guidelines.

IMC UK is an interactive site offering inclusive participation. All postings to the open publishing newswire are the responsibility of the individual authors and not of IMC UK. Although IMC UK volunteers attempt to ensure accuracy of the newswire, they take no responsibility legal or otherwise for the contents of the open publishing site. Mention of external web sites or services is for information purposes only and constitutes neither an endorsement nor a recommendation.

Some background

03.02.2009 17:09

The reason nobody has been paid since Sept 2008 is that was when the factory was closed. This followed over nine months of daily strikes with demands as varied as

40% pay increase
reduction in working hours by one third !
no punishment for theft of raw materials by staff
retirement pension at 55 not the current 65 at full pay



The owners went bankrupt gave up and lost all their investment in the plant. Everybody was made redundant and the factory closed. The answer from the works council was to call another strike !

The owners begged and begged them not to strike on the day that a potential buyer form Germany visited, they not only called a strike but also abused the German visitors and gave them leaflets saying they would only return to work after a one off payment of USD150 per worker to compensate them for the money they lost when on strike that day.

If the workers really think that occupiying an empty factory that they have already put out of business is a good thing then they are more stupid then I think.

main in london but knows the background


Machno must be getting pissed off, general strike!

04.02.2009 05:58

its gotta happen some time, whoever kicks it off for a proper global revolution, will live longer than maradonna or Pele. Would be "revolutionary" dictators should stay out of way, people wont stand for it much longer.

Rob Ludd, from the Forest


Hide 1 hidden comment or hide all comments