The railway drivers and government officials are close to reaching a deal, that should avert the national strike on Thursday. The deal has not been officially announced yet.

The negotiations between the two sides had reached a deadlock yesterday, with the government insisting on giving the drivers who were transfered to other jobs due to medical conditions 60% of their full salary. One detail I missed translating in my previous posting was that the government was also insistent on applying this package deal ONLY to the workers who were medically discharged starting from the day of the agreement. As for those who were medically discharged from their driving jobs on dates prior to the agreement, they get nothing but their basic salary. The workers’ representatives initially insisted on the full salary with bonuses for BOTH: those who get medically discharged prior or after the date of reaching the agreement. The strike leaders insisted on not leaving their fellow colleagues behind.
After difficult negotiations the govt, according to a socialist source, agreed today on giving the workers 80% of the full salary, but insisted that would not apply to their fellow colleagues who were medically discharged prior to the date of the agreement. The workers’ representatives refused again.

The government gave the workers a final choice between either 80% of the salary but only this applies to the workers post-agreement, or 60% to everyone (prior- and post-agreement cases).
The workers chose to go with the 60% so as not to leave their colleagues behind. It was a beautiful gesture of solidarity, I was told, that won the consensus of the drivers.There are other details also to the agreement which I still haven’t learned yet, but according to those I spoke to, the morale among the railway and metro drivers is very high, and they have a sense of victory.

The compromise is expected to avert the national strike that was planned for Thursday.

On another front, I learned that 15,000 workers from the Mahalla Textile workers have signed a petition to the General Union for Textile Workers, demanding the impeachment of their 21-member Factory Union Committee, which is dominated by union bureaucrats with close ties to the security services. The union officials took a negative stand towards the Decemeber strike, and conspired with the management against the strikers. The number of signatories is increasing every day. In case their demand is not met, I was told the Mahalla workers are preparing a radical response: The formation of a new labor union in the factory, independent from the state-dominated General Federation for Trade Unions…

Keep your eyes out on Mahalla for next week…