News

Disinformation, riot police, and hired thugs

The E.Land workers' struggle for their jobs has now continued for 100 days. The Korean retailer's owner Park Sung-soo (Park Song) and his management are showing no signs of wanting a negotiated solution. Instead they keep relying on riot police and thugs hired to attack picketing workers. Ten union representatives remain in police jails.

E.Land turns cold shoulder to government mediation - waiting for power shift?

Reportedly, the E.Land management has turned a cold shoulder to the Korean Labour Minister Lee Sang-soo and his recent attempts to broker a solution to the conflict between the company and its workers. Apparently, Mr Park Sung-soo and his company are waiting for the Korean presidential elections in December, where the right-wing Grand National Party stands a good chance to gain a majority. This could then put an end to to the last remnants of understanding for the workers' cause.

Last week, demonstrating E.Land workers were brutally attacked by so-called strike breakers, or hired thugs. Apparently, at least some of them were carrying iron bars. Throwing buckets of water chilled to the freezing point on the pickets, they tried to force them to withdraw.

A manifestation in Seoul during the weekend was terminated by riot police, who dragged away some 150 workers for interrogation at various police stations. On the company's demand, huge fines have been hung over the E.Land workers' trade union and its striking members, to scare them off from any action.

Pressure on internet service providers to remove workers' blog and discussion articles

E.Land is also trying to shut down the voices of its workers. The company has put pressure on internet service providers and got them to remove critical blog articles and discussion contributions. Instead, mainstream newspapers have been engaged to attack the strike and spread false information about it on the editorial pages.

It is clear that all these measures are flagrant violations of ILO International Labour Conventions and the OECD Code on Conduct for Multinational Companies. In cooperation with the Korean trade unions, UNI Commerce is preparing formal interventions with the international authorities.

There is more to E.Land's attack on its workers than what meets the eye.

Greedy large employers want the cheap labour of non-regular workers

This is a fight to keep the country's big population of non-regular workers down and thus to preserve the reservoir of cheap labour. E.Land and its supporters are not small or medium enterprises, these are huge companies whose driving force is greed, not a struggle for survival on the market. Most competitors have already taken steps to start regularising their non-regular workforce, which speaks its clear language about E.Land's anti-social and irresponsible behaviour.

But this is also a fight by E.Land and its supporters to deny the Korean workers their right to join and belong to a trade union. Through huge compensation claims, the company believes that it will be able to destroy not only the E.Land workers' trade union, but also its federation and confederation.

The Korean Thanksgiving holiday - Chusok - is early this year, in only two weeks time. It looks like E.Land has missed its chance to repair the damage that the company has caused to itself - and its tenants in the store galleries - by refusing to take the government's mediation efforts seriously.

On the labour side, it is clear that the E.Land workers and their unions will continue their struggle. It is equally clear that international support through UNI and the rest of the global trade union movement will be stepped up. Preparations for further action are going on, and this includes a proper response to the Korean retailer's intentions to open it Who.A.U. store chain in the United States later this year.

UNI Commerce

articles and pictures

on E.Land workers'

fight for their jobs