News

UNI Finance planned a two day organizing workshop for Barclays Bank of Zimbabwe shop stewards from the 31st of October to the 1st of November 2014. The training was organized in collaboration with Zimbabwe Banks and Allied Workers Union, (ZIBAWU) and is part of a larger initiative sponsored by LO-TCO and covering seven countries to strenghten the unions of the Barclays Africa Alliance.

The workshop was attended by twenty shop stewards from Barclays Bank of Zimbabwe branches. The lead facilitator, Jesse Wilderman took the group through the basics of organizing at the work place. He covered topics such as holding organizing conversations and how to overcome objections. Jesse was impressed with the active participation of the team over the two day period.

The attendees adopted an organizing plan which will run during the course of the year. Part of the plan included recruiting non-members into the Union and organizing employees around the key issues which were identified during the workshop.

 The comrades left energized and wihsing that the same kind of training could be extended to other banks in Zimbabwe.

Similar organizing workshops are being planned to take place in Botswana, Uganda and Tanzania.

The Barclays Africa alliance members will also meet during the UNI Global Union World Congress in Cape Town in December 2014. On the long-term, the goal is to have well-established unions in all the key countries where Barclays operate to negotiate collective agreements and a global framework agreement which would raise the standards and rights for all the workers working for Barclays around the world.