ATIK | Confederation of Workers from Turkey in Europe | AHM-ATIK News Center
ÇORLU | 23 – 01 – 2011 | Çorlu is an industrialized town that is one hour away from Istanbul. Our Union has been active in Çorlu since 1990s. We had successes in some periods and signed collective agreements however after 2000, by the coordinated attacks of bosses, military and other institutions of the state, we could not succeeded in saving our organizational structure.
Çorlu is a cheap labor heaven for the employers. There is no a regulation for the working conditions. Workers earn about 300 euro per month, they can not get their over working payments. They work long hours that may be until 11 pm or even 24 hours. Social insurance is another problem. Additionally there is a huge environmental problem in Çorlu as a result of the profit maximization motivation of the employers. Our success in organizing workers would not only increase the life standards of the workers, also would have positive impact on environment and improvement of democracy in the town.
Yeşil Kundura is a well known shoe brand in Turkey. It produces for Rubber Duck, Dr. Martens, Sanük, Minnetonka, Hush Puppies, Cat Foot Wear, Harley Davidson, Merrel, and Wolverine.
There are 400 workers in its factory in Çorlu. We have about 150 members. When the administration learned our Union’s organizational activities, 3 women members were fired and they initiated the resistance in front of the factory in May 27, 2010. On 3rd of June, the workers in resistance and the Union’s representatives were taken in custody. The resistance continued for 78 days.
During this process, we had negation with the boss, Engin Yeşil three times. He told us that he had lived in the USA for 20 years, he was giving importance to the social dialogue, and he had been kind to the Unions and promised us to reinstate three women workers. He requested from us that this case would not be such in DESA, he demanded from us not to initiate an international campaign.
As a consequence of these promises, our Union gave an end to the resistance in order to advance the social dialogue. However these three women members have not been reinstated until now. Additionally in October, the administration paid 3000 to 5000 TL to some of our members to resign and about 10 members were resigned. Therefore our Union asked the boss to obey his promises otherwise we would declare the situation to the public and re-initiate our campaign. Engin Yeşil promised us to negotiate and demanded from us to wait one week at the third week of November however until now, we could not meet with him, he did not respond to our calls.
We kindly request from you to make pressure over the company to accept our just demands.
The phone of Yeşil Kundura shoe factory: 00 90 212 414 06 00
Faks : + 90 212 481 91 76
The phone of Yeşil Construction: Tel: (+90) 212 482 05 00
Faks: (+90) 212 483 33 35
e-mail: info @ yesilinsaat.com.tr
Thank you.
Best regards
15.12.2010
Musa Servi
President
Deri-İş Sendikası
Turkish Leather and Shoe Workers Union
