Officials from the General Federation of
Bahrain Trade Unions (GFBTU) will attend a conference in Kuwait next week to
discuss the issue with colleagues from across Asia.
Activities and programmes head Karim Radhi
said less than 10 per cent of the body's membership of around 25,000 were
expatriates.
He said the unrest and the events of the last
year had put on hold GFBTU plans to conduct nationwide campaigns to encourage
foreign workers to join trade unions in their respective companies.
"The
crisis last year and reinstatement of workers put on the shelf the issue to
unionise migrant workers," he said.
Mr Radhi will travel to Kuwait with board
member Mohammed Abdulrahman for the three-day event, which starts on Monday.
"In
this Kuwait conference we will raise the issue of migrant workers with
unionists from Nepal, Pakistan and other Asian countries," said Mr Radhi.
He revealed expatriates tend to shy away from
joining unions as they fear they may lose their jobs or have their residence
permits cancelled if their employers find out.
"We
understand that foreign workers are afraid to come out and join unions because
of pressure from their employers," said Mr Radhi.
He said in some companies such as Bapco and
Alba, workers were automatically given union membership after being hired.
"Our
plan in the future is to work on a sectoral union in the construction
industry," said the union leader.
"This
will be the biggest union in the country in terms of representation as it would
cover thousands of workers."
The GFBTU previously joined forces with the
Swiss-based Building and Wood Worker's International (BWI) to push for a
national construction union to protect rights of migrant workers.
It also last month tied up with Indian National
Trade Union Congress (INTUC) to work on pre-departure training programme for
workers travelling from Kerala.
As part of the initiative by International
Trade Union Congress, GFBTU and INTUC will work to impart training on labour
rights for workers from Kerala travelling to Gulf countries.
Meanwhile, Mr Radhi was re-elected as
secretary onto the Gulf Industrial Investment Company trade union during its
elections held last month.
Hussain Abdulla was elected as GIIC union
chairman and other members elected were Majeed Naser Ahmed as deputy chairman,
Ali Naseeb as treasurer, Mohammed Jawad in charge of membership, Hassan Alaradi
in charge of working women and Hussain Al Nakal in charge of working youth.
"The
board also decided to create a mechanism to encourage all migrant workers in
the company to be union members and form their own committee in the
union," said Mr Radhi.
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