News

During the strike, the Union Basin-Is, has been gaining members. Some workers with high positions have joined the union. Another group of workers is expected to join the union shortly.



As a result of the initiatives taken by UNI and Ver.di, Dr. Ottenberg, stressed in his letter that: “We hope that the struggles at E-Kart come to an end as soon as possible, and that all E-Kart employees can focus again on serving your customers. E-Kart’s employees are the basis of the commercial success and long term sustainability of the company.”



After this letter, E-Kart Management withdrew their appeal to the Supreme Court against the ruling of the Labour Court that the strike by E-Kart employees is legal.



Members of Basin-Is have now met the management and strongly demanded that Management start collective bargaining with Basin-Is. All union members sent a letter to E-Kart presenting their demands to E-Kart and its partners G&D and Eczacibasi. They wrote: ‘We are extremely disturbed at the obstruction of our rights to unionise and collective bargaining since August 2006. “Our demand is for collective bargaining to begin as soon as possible.”



Meanwhile, production in E-Kart has decreased by nearly 75% since the strike. E-Kart has been seeking another plant to which it can transfer a large portion of the production. They were refused by the G&D German Plant and Nitra, the Slovak Plant. Now they are looking at the G&D Barcelona Plant. It is strange. E-Kart refuses collective bargaining and a union at its Turkish plant, but is trying to transfer its production to a well unionised workplace in Spain.



Other unions in Istanbul are joining the resistance and strike. They meet under the umbrella of the Turk-Is Istanbul Branches. They held a press conference in front of UNILEVER Logistics where the workers have been fighting for the right of workers to organise unions.



At IBM Turkey, the management has rejected an application for recognition from the TezKoop-Is union. The union claims to have organised 80% of the workers. The labour Minister has informed IBM that they should recognise and start collective bargaining with the union. The union is preparing to strike if the management does not act quickly.



UNI Global Union, UNI Europa and UNI G and their members in different unions of the world firmly support the Turkish workers and their unions in the fight for the workers rights.



For more information about the conflict in E-Kart, please contact :



Adriana.rosenzvaig@uniglobalunion.org