ALGIERS, April 17 — The common services in the health sector went on a two-day strike yesterday and invaded the grounds of the Mustapha Bacha hospital in the capital here. They’re striking against unbearable working conditions, receiving no compensation for possible contact with contagious diseases and are refused civil service status despite years of work.
Police used vans to block the gate opening onto May Day Square and cops were stationed behind the gate. Striking security guards helped organize the march and protected the workers from any attacks.
Workers chanted slogans against the Minister of Health, shouting, “No to marginalization” and waving their pay stubs, charging that talk of an increase in the gross salary was an April Fool’s joke.
The strikers include women cleaners, administrative staff and security guards. Their stories reveal the extent of the special oppression of women.
“We were totally fed up; it was high time to raise our voices against such conditions, in short, to blow our tops,” said one woman cleaner. “I’ve been working for 32 years, receive shabby pay, no transport bonus, no contagious diseases bonus, no health-risk bonus,” she continued. She’s past 50 and nearing retirement age.
Another women cleaner showed her pay stub: “I get 10,000 Algerian dinars ($135) a month and — pinch yourself! — they even give me the job of cleaning the medical instruments, getting the patients dressed and more,” she shouted angrily.
Another striker said disgustedly: “I was contaminated by a microbe on the job and I was even operated on for that. I filed to demand my rights, and they told me that you can be contaminated even outside the hospital and rejected my demand.”
These stories expose the lengths capitalism will go to super-exploit women workers. And it shows how ready they are to fight back. Only a communist society that eliminates bosses, profits and the exploitative wage system can free women workers from this special oppression and all workers from this bondage.