When almost 10 years have passed since the start of the revolution, the masses are cutting the production of the most important gas field in the country
Unemployed workers fight for decent work by attacking private property
On Friday, July 17, thousands of unemployed people marched towards the El Kamour gas field, the most important one in Tunisia, located in Tataouine, in the south of the country. By closing the gas pump valve, they let the government know that they are not willing to continue without work, without bread, suffering from hunger in a Tunisia that is sinking in a brutal economic crisis.
The official unemployment in Tunisia at the beginning of the year was 15%, and for the youth it is three times more. But in recent months that number has skyrocketed, since with the pandemic and the strict quarantine imposed by the government, tourism, gastronomy, hotels, borders, airports have been closed ...which means 25% of formal employment (not to mention the informal one). The layoffs have been massive and the workers have not been receiving their wages. All street sales were also banned, leaving many unemployed unable to earn their daily bread. Besides that, due to the closure of schools and public buildings, many public sector workers were not collecting their wages.
By April this year, the situation was so exasperating that Hammadi Chalbi set himself on fire (as Bouazizi had done in 2011) due to the government's refusal to grant him permission to sell food, even though this item was not banned during quarantine.
By the end of April, the youth of Tataouine returned to the streets demanding jobs and responses from the government, which did not comply in the creation of jobs that it had announced in 2017, when it was cornered by a workers' huge fight.
Months passed and misery deepened. For this reason, at the beginning of July, thousands of unemployed people won the streets again and on July 17 they ended up interrupting the operation of the main gas field in the country. The unemployed took a step forward in their fight for decent work, fencing and attacking the private property of the capitalists and a nerve center of the Tunisian state.
The workers have returned to the streets of Tunis once again, as in 2018 against misery wages, as in 2017 against unemployment, as they recurrently did in 2013, 2015, 2016 ... The cause is the 2011 revolution did not succeed. The immolation of Hammadi Chalbi for the same reason as Mohammed Bouazizi's, more than 9 years later, indicates precisely that the demands of the revolution have not been solved.
There is no dignity. Workers continue to suffer from hunger, youth remain unemployed and with no possibility of a future.
Tunisia's "democracy" was a swindle against the revolution. It was a detour to put old politicians from the Ben Ali regime again in charge, while maintaining the same military and judges' caste. And in the face of the workers' struggle, the government sent the army, which had posed neutral in 2011, to guard private property and gas wells. Moreover, Tunisia remains a nation completely subject to imperialism, especially the French one.
This shows that what the left claimed was a lie, repeating like charlatan parrots what the imperialist press announced, i.e. that in Tunisia it was the only place where democracy had been conquered by the revolution. Contrariwise, in Tunisia there is neither bread nor work, that is, there is no dignity, not even freedom, as the nation continues to be oppressed by imperialism and the judges and the armed forces continue to maintain power in Tunisia.
Attacking the private property as the unemployed did in Tataouine is the path to be followed. Expropriation without compensation of all the gas, electricity and mining companies, under workers' control, to put all the wealth of the nation at the service of the exploited! Jobs for all, dividing up the working hours, to guarantee that every worker has a decent job, with a salary equal to the family basket.
To solve the problem of bread, to have jobs for all and a decent life, we must return to the path of 2011 and lead that revolution to victory. This is also the case in Sudan, Egypt, ánd in Lebanon and Iraq today in revolt. It is the same revolutionary chain throughout the region, which today returns to Tunisia, the country that was the spark in 2011. From Tataouine to the wave of strikes by Iranian workers, to the exploited Lebanese and Iraqis who do not leave the streets, to the Syrian resistance ... The same intifada!
Editorial Committee of the Newspaper "The Truth of the Oppressed",
Spokesperson for the socialists of Syria and the Middle East
