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Workers Vanguard No. 878 |
13 October 2006 |
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ILWU Support Key Filipino Seamen Win Strike in L.A. Eighteen Filipino crewmen aboard the M/V Endless, owned by a Greek company and registered in Panama, went on strike in the L.A. area Port of Long Beach for four days last month, and they won with the support of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU). The seafarers set up a picket line at the top of the gangway, carrying signs that read: “Seamen on Strike for Wages, Hours and Conditions.” The company had cheated them out of $362,000 in back wages and refused them break time, with most of the crew not having been home for two or three years.
The strike began on September 7 after an inspector for the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF)—a global organization of dockers, seamen, truckers and rail and aviation unions—investigated the books and confirmed the crew was owed back wages. ILWU Local 13 members, backed by the ILWU International, honored the picket line and stopped loading the ship. With the Endless paralyzed and another ship blocked from the berth, the owners granted $227,000 in back pay, and acceded to the crew’s demands for repatriation at company expense and the promise that they would not be blacklisted. This victory gives a taste of the power of international labor solidarity in action.
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