1st MAY “INTERNATIONAL WORKERS’ DAY 2024 MESSAG
More than a century since the uprising of workers in Chicago in 1886 in pursuit of better working conditions, improved wages and a better life, workers in the 21st Century are still engaged in the very struggle of their predecessors.
The occasion of the International Workers’ Day serves as the ultimate expression of the centrality of class struggle and international working-class struggle in advancing the class agenda of workers and the working class broadly. The world proletariat uses this day to demonstrate the interconnectedness of its struggles on the international stage.
The 2024 International Workers Day celebrations coincides with on-going wars and conflicts in DRC, Libya, Syria, Sudan, Ukraine and the genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, while on one hand, the Western imperialists continues with their illegal economic blockade against Cuba, on the other hand the occupations in Palestine and Western Sahara still persist.
The working class internationalism dictate that the organized contingent of the working class everywhere through its organisations should constantly highlight the plight of all oppressed peoples everywhere in the world. At the same time, workers in the public and related sectors are faced by a number of challenges that requires the intensification of a class struggle against the ruling elites. The rising cost of living crisis, attacks on collective bargaining, stagnant wages and the general deteriorating working conditions driven by austerity has a negative impact on public service workers and the public at large.
On this international day of workers’ celebrations, we have noted very serious the concerted neoliberal effort aimed at attacking workers through undermining their rights and the reversal of their historic hard-won gains fought through struggles and sacrifices. The bosses concede nothing to the working class without concerted struggles waged by the oppressed and they are always ready to reverse such concessions as soon as the conditions allow. Thus, the working class and its organisations must always be in a state of mobilization and organised for class action to advance our own class interests.
Ultimately, the oppressed can only overcome their oppression by confronting the source of that oppression. The conflict between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat is a struggle between capitalist and socialist values. It is the struggle to establish the dictatorship of the proletariat over the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, this is a concrete message we are categorically conveying to bosses and capitalist on this international day of workers which affirms TUI PS&A commitment to the outcry: “Workers of the world unite you have nothing to lose but your chains” more than ever before as it build strong, united and fighting trade union international for public service and allied workers under the umbrella of a class-oriented World Federation of Trade Unions, the WFTU.
International Workers Day is an occasion to remind ourselves of the immense challenges imposed on us by our class enemies and our class responsibility to never fail or falter in confronting those challenges. At the same time, we steadfast against any exploitation of a man by man and also warn the bosses in the public service and allied that TUI PS&A shall never ever fold its arms watching them attacking workers’ rights and eroding bargaining rights. As workers, we today celebrate the milestones of our struggles such as the International Workers Day through the intensification of our efforts in the very struggles for emancipation of public servants and workers of the world in general.
Viva International Workers Day!
Forward to International Working-Class Solidarity!!
Issued by TUI PS&A
Zola Saphetha
General Secretary