Low wages spur massive strike

Yemen - The General Labor Union in Yemen (GLU) called all workers in Yemen to initiate a general strike starting on Saturday, May 15.

The strike comes to protest against low wages and because the government doesn’t respond to the demands by GLU that were delivered to the Prime Minister, Ali Mujawar and Mohammed al-Jedri, Chairman of the GLU.

“This came after the failure of the previous agreement between the government and GLU, which set up a committee of the parties to study the demands of theGLU after the GLU had called to raise the red decals.” al-Jedri said.

We will begin a general strike on May 15 in all of the government, mixed, and private facilities in all of the governorates of Yemen if the authorities do not respond to our demands.Σ GLU said in press release. Exceptions to the strike are the emergency services in hospitals, electricity, the water sector, and airline control towers.

GLU called for $300 as minimum wage to reduce the gap between the maximum and minimum wages, reducing income taxes, and fixing the contractors situation, including cleaners, in addition to other demands.

GLU will start striking for one hour next Saturday and Sunday and two hours on Monday and Tuesday and three hours on Wednesday then completely strike starting on Monday, May 24.

GLU consists of twelve general syndicates nationally and has fifteen branches in several governorates; it also has 3,500 syndicates and currently has 521,000 members.

The first GLU was established in Aden in 1956, and later a general union was established in Sana’a.