Led by metalworkers and nurses, more than 70,000 workers from more than 140 trade unions joined the first day of a general strike which swept South Korea on May 31, according to the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), which organised the strike.
The strikers were campaigning for: a reduction of the work week from six to five days (40 hours); a halt to the plan to sell Daewoo Motors to foreign interests (which the workers fear would mean further job losses in this and other firms); and protection of the fast expanding casual work force. The KCTU said it resorted to collective action after the government failed to respond to the confederation's repeated call for negotiation.
Apart from work stoppages in hospitals and across other industries, solidarity support rallies or marches were held in more than 10 cities on May 31. On that day, a big contingent of workers from the Livestock Farmers Cooperative Staff Union converged in Seoul to join the strikers.
More protest actions were planned for at least the next four days, to cumulate in a national workers' rally on June 4 in which 50,000 people are expected to take part. A second national people's rally is planned for June 10, sponsored by the KCTU and 30 other organisations, including the National Federation of Farmers Association.
Explaining the urgency for the national mobilisations, the KCTU stressed the bosses' attacks since the 1997-98 Asian economic crisis, in particular their throwing out the window of collective bargaining agreements and sweeping casualisation of the work force. These assaults happened despite the goodwill decision by workers to accept wage cuts and forego wage payments to help their employers through the economic difficulty.
The KCTU pointed out that in the public sector, where 30% of jobs were slashed, sackings were a tactic to seriously slash working conditions. Many workers were rehired practically the next day under new terms, the confederation said.
The KCTU also called for a halt to the government's plan to forcibly amalgamate the agricultural cooperatives and the livestock farmers cooperatives, a move widely opposed by the workers.
BY EVA CHENG