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The Egyptian Centre for Social Rights reported 1,400 collective worker actions in 2011 and nearly 2,000 in 2012. It cited 2,400 social and economic protests during the first quarter of 2013.
CAIRO, Sep 9 2013 (IPS) - It was the Egyptian state’s brutal restrictions on worker freedoms that
transformed Kareem El-Beheiry from a disengaged lay worker into a tenacious labour activist.
In April 2008, El-Beheiry was arrested during mass demonstrations that followed a government crackdown on workers protesting low wages and rising living costs in Mahalla El-Kubra, an industrial city 100 kilometres north of Cairo. The young factory worker had used his mobile phone to capture and share video footage of fierce clashes between security forces and protesters until
police swooped in and grabbed him.
Authorities accused El-Beheiry of using his blog on labour rights to instigate the Mahalla uprising, which originated at the textile mill where he worked. Three people were killed and hundreds injured in two days of rioting that engulfed the city after state security forces stormed the factory to prevent thousands of striking workers from gathering there.
El-Beheiry, now 28, recalls how he spent two months in prison, where he was abused, deprived of food, and tortured with electric shocks. Even after his release, he had to fight a legal battle to return to his job – the factory’s manager had sacked him for failing to show up for work
during his imprisonment.Reinstated on a court order, the flagged employee was transferred to the state-owned company’s Cairo office in 2009, where he was fired three months later on spurious charges.
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Striking workers: Egypt’s new military-led government has adopted the same tough line on labour activism and trade unions as its predecessors.
Credit: Cam McGrath/IPS.
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