By Bill W. Cooper
The Government, through the Ministry of Labour, has given official authorization to private health and education workers across the country, to form or join trade unions of their choice.
Labor Minister, Cllr. Cooper Kruah said the official mandate was in line with Convention #87 of the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the Liberian Constitution, which grants freedom of association to workers at work place by unionizing or membership.
Minister Kruah emphasized the importance of this official authorization in light of consistent concerns being raised by Liberia’s international tripartite partners at conferences and aimed to end decades of confusion over the rights of workers in the two categories to form or join trade unions.
“By this authorization, all private schools and health workers, including nurses and teachers, are free to form themselves into organized trade unions or join which existing ones of their free will”, the Minister noted.
Addressing a news conference recently, Minister Kruah then reminded private school and health workers, encountering problems at their places of work, hereafter, to contact the Labor Ministry for redress.
The Minister, similarly, clarified that teachers and healthy workers at public institutions are governed by The Civil Service Agency (CSA) Standing Regulations; thus, being required to relate to the CSA for issues arising at their assigned places of work.
He stressed that these clarifications are needed so as to once and for all allay the past confusion regarding such matter.
Also speaking during the news conference, Liberia Labour Congress (LLC) Secretary General, Marcus N. Blamah, thanked Minister Kruah for promptly addressing outcries of workers concerned with the authorization and other issues.
He appealed for blanket inclusion of all health and education workers, as well as civil servants, under the Labour Ministry Authorization to be debarred from the CSA Regulations in joining or forming trade unions.
The SG further expressed gratitude to Minister Kruah for his smooth working relationship with the trade union community in addressing existing concerns, and said, “We look forward to the glorious day when the constitutional restrictions on all civil servants to unionize or join trade unions will be removed, as this will ensure a peaceful industrial atmosphere.”
Blamah then assured Minister Kruah of LLC’s commitment to relay the Labour Ministry’s authorization to all private school and health workers across the fifteen sub-political divisions of the country.
