Al-Ghad

The rise of oil workers’ movement in occupied Iraq is not new. The movement is organised country wide body representing 26,000 workers known as the Iraqi Federation of Oil Unions (IFOU), presided by Hassan Jumaa Awad al Assadi, who is active in presenting the case of the federation in many countries. The union leaders have already received death threats, not something to be ignored in a country like occupied Iraq today, yet the movement continues its defiant stands in support of the interests of its members, and those of the Iraqi people as a whole. The IFOU has already carried out three successful strikes, several days long, since 2003.

What’s new is the widening of the support for the IFOU among increasing sections of Iraqi society opposed to sectarianism and corruption of those promoted by the US occupation forces. Mr. Awad, the president of IFOU, does not limit the policy to narrow trade interests, but expressed the broader battle for the control of the huge Iraqi oil reserves by the international monopolies. He recently said: “Iraq is passing through the most difficult of times, because all and sundry are hounding it and covet a share of its riches. Everyone knows that the oil law does not serve the Iraqi people, and that it serves Bush, his supporters and the foreign companies at their expense.” He also said to UPI, on May 24, “First of all, we are against the production sharing agreements”.

The main battle fought now by the IFOU, is its declaration in a letter to the Prime Minister on May 5, to go on full strike. They planned to do so on May 10, but the strike was postponed twice since then, the last was in the expectation to meet the Iraqi President, as a government official said, on May 16. The situation is becoming tense, as the deadline of May 31, of passing the Oil Law by Parliament, is only few days away. As the UPI news agency put it, May 24: “ Iraqi oil unions aren’t shutting off the crude taps yet, awaiting a response from the prime minister … before striking”. A strike would signal the unions’ power among Iraq’s political leadership in Baghdad adding “another voice to the disgruntled reaction to the law.”

These developments, coming as they are in the wake of the disintegration of the US adventure in occupying Iraq, the gathering clouds in the Gulf and elsewhere, together with the sudden rise of oil prices, could magnify the slightest sparks far beyond their size.

The voice of the most advanced, and best organized, sector of the Iraqi working class, has started to join forces with other mass non-violent popular resistance against the occupation, marking a new welcome shift in dire situation in the country, away from the docile and corrupt administration, and the blood thirsty sectarian gangs that occupation had set-up.

Al-Ghad