The post-revolution challenges for Tunisian workers

The Union Générale Tunisienne du Travail (UGTT) is etched into Tunisia’s psyche. Founded in 1946 during the country’s independence struggle, its militants recently played a crucial role in the 2011 revolution. However, two years after the protests, Tunisians and the members of UGTT are still facing serious social challenges and widespread uncertainty about their future.

Abdelkarim Jrad, the UGTT deputy general secretary for social security, says Tunisians have gained freedom of expression, the right to have political parties and the right to build civil society.

He said, however, that the revolution has also meant that Tunisians have “a lower standard of living – particularly for poorer families, insecurity, [and] an increase in the unemployment rate.”

Official figures, which he questions, put unemployment at 16.8 per cent. Over 400,000 graduates are without work.It is a widespread view that unemployment was a central element in the riots which overthrew President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali.

The funding for pensions, health and medical insurance is also a potentially serious issue. The money comes from contributions by employers and employees, but this does not cover the costs.

“For the UGTT it is necessary to find other sources for the funds apart from the contributors,” said Jrad. He is hopeful that a social contract signed in January by employers, UGTT and the government will provide a basis for negotiations.

Last August, the BBC reported that the draft of the new Tunisian constitution provoked demonstrations by women protesting against the wording which proclaimed women as ‘complementary to men.’

The current draft of the new constitution is controversial. Law professor Aicha Hamza Safi says that the draft constitution talks of rights which are “inspired by the cultural heritage of the Tunisian people founded on their Arab-Muslim identity.”

Jrad notes that “the UGTT demands social rights, the right to work, the right to health for everybody. The current draft version [of the constitution] does not guarantee social rights, all the rights are conditional in the draft constitution.”

There are very few women amongst officials of the UGTT. The 13 member UGTT executive committee has no women on it at all. At the national conference, which elected the new post-Ben Ali leadership in December 2011, there were 518 delegates. Only 13 were women.

In addition, the mass of officials from the Ben Ali period hampered the UGTT after the revolution, argues UGTT teachers’ union general secretary, Lassad Yacoubi. Yacoubi believes that the UGTT needs restructuring to give more power to the sectors and decrease bureaucracy.

The UGTT mirrors Tunisian society: both need to be restructured for democracy and freedom; the people from Ben Ali’s time have to step down; the new generation of women and young people need to take their proper place; and reactionary ideas have to be overcome.

History of the UGTT

The founding of UGTT was linked to the anti-colonial independence movements in North Africa in the late 1940s and 1950s. Its founder, Farhat Hached, was assassinated by French colonialists.

During the dictatorship of President Ben Ali the UGTT was closely linked to the government; any strikes required the agreement of the executive committee of the UGTT. Amnesty International in a 2009 report noted: “Any strike not authorized by the UGTT is considered illegal and participants can face up to eight months in prison.”

However, on the ground, rank and file UGTT militants organised and fought against President Ben Ali.

According to Le Monde Diplomatique: “Since Tunisian independence in 1956, there have been two currents within the UGTT: one, represented by what is commonly called the ‘union bureaucracy’, of submission to the government, the other of resistance to it.”

The UGTT is loathed by the current religious government of the Ennahda Party. For example, on 4 December 2012, the day before the 60th commemoration of the murder of Hached, a group of members were attacked by ‘The League for the Protection of the Revolution,’ a group widely believed to be linked to Ennahda.

When the opposition leader Chokri Belaid was assassinated earlier this year, the UGTT called a general strike on the day of his funeral, 8 February. The New York Times called it the “largest labor strike in decades.”

Jrad, claims a UGTT membership of 750,000 in a country where four million people are economically active. It has representation throughout the Tunisian economy and is strongest in the state sector and civil service.

The story of a revolution

According to Yacoubi the revolution started long before 2011. By 2005, the opposition to Ben Ali, often organising under the protection of the UGTT, was able to go onto the streets and gain some media coverage.

In April 2007, teachers – who are one of the most militant sections of the UGTT – went out on national strike. In November 2007, three teachers – whose contracts were not renewed after the strike – went on hunger strike demanding reinstatement and inspiring international protests and solidarity actions: “This was the first time we managed to really damage the core of the regime of Ben Ali,” said Yacoubi.

In January 2008, a few weeks after the end of the hunger strike, riots erupted in Gafsa, a phosphate mining area over recruitment practices of the largest local employer, the Gasfa Phosphate Company: “We consider [those protests] as the first date of the revolution against Ben Ali,” said Yacoubi.

“From then on the battle against Ben Ali changed… before it was the battle of the [opposition] movement, then it became the battle of the people.”

After another three years of struggle, Ben Ali fled in January 2011 as Tunisians crowded the streets demanding freedom. But the revolution is unfinished; the fight for democracy, freedom, justice and social rights continues.

The fate of Tunisia’s revolution is still in the balance.