LET us recognise Pakistan’s labour, this first of May in the eighth year of the 21st century. This extraordinary plea stems from six decades of the state’s dillydallying on conceding workers their due. Off and on they have been promised much and allowed little.

Their rights have been subjected to restrictions to the point of their being negated. Indeed, efforts have been consistently made to erase their identity as the most conscious and effective agents of change.

The workers’ spirits have been buoyed by the new prime minister’s promise to guarantee freedom to the trade unions, revise the IRO, abolish all anti-labour laws and establish a regime that is in accord with ILO conventions. Also, the government’s decision to ratify the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has raised hopes of acceptance of the people’s right to work, of women’s right to equal wages, of everybody’s right to subsistence and social security.

Some people think the government has, in a fit of exuberance, set itself a difficult task. That may well be true. Yet, not only the workers’ interest but the good of Pakistan as a whole demands that the government must pursue its undertaking with utmost sincerity so that labour is spared the frustrations it has had to suffer decade after decade.

At the time of independence, Pakistan’s workers inherited the legacy of a dynamic trade union movement. Though numerically weak, they had a fairly functional legal cover. The Trade Union Act of 1926 offered them an easy way to form unions, which were not allowed in only the defence forces. Industry-wise and craft-based unions of workers employed by different employers were possible. Half the office-bearers of the respective unions could be outsiders, middle-class friends of labour who brought strength to weak and inexperienced labour leaders. Labour unions could donate funds to political parties (who were fighting the Raj).

The expression ‘collective bargaining agent’ had not been recognised but workers used strikes, backed by civil society, to move forward, gaining every inch after paying a heavy price in blood and sweat. Their struggles obliged the colonial administration to accept the ILO principles, to ratify some of its key conventions, and institute a system of tripartite consultation to move towards progressive alleviation of the workers’ plight.

Partition dealt a near-fatal blow to trade unions and the kisan movement. Although the five-year plan to improve labour’s condition adopted by the government of India in 1946 was endorsed at the first tripartite conference in 1949, no serious effort was made to implement it. Pakistan did sign the ILO Convention 87 (the right to form unions) and 98 (the right to collective bargaining) in 1951 but the 1950s were marked by the state’s neglect of labour’s cause.

The governments feared the egalitarian creed of trade union leaders and chose to finish off the unions. They were hit by the Essential Services Act and the Security Act, both of 1952. If nothing else, labour leaders (Mirza Ibrahim and C.R. Aslam) could be arrested under the vagrancy law.

The first martial law regime announced, with great fanfare, an 11-point plan that began with a pledge to base the labour policy on the ILO conventions and recommendations ratified by Pakistan, but soon added 28 industries to essential services (where unions were not allowed). Labour Minister Gen Burki threatened to administer electric shocks to industrialists who failed to provide housing to their employees, but in fact all shocks were reserved for the workers. The unions were barred from having outsiders as office-bearers and mandatory litigation to solve disputes was introduced to undercut collective bargaining.

The Yahya regime won high praise for its labour policy. The Industrial Relations Ordinance of 1969 provided for employers-employees joint consultation, a ‘check off’ system (collection of union subscription by employers), settlement of grievance through labour courts (and labour appellate tribunals), determination of collective bargaining agents and some protection to union office-bearers. But the right to unionise was curtailed. The policy failed for want of seriousness in its enforcement.

The Bhutto government’s 22-point labour reform package not only offered workers handsome concessions (some of which made union leaders allies of the employers) but was also enforced in a better way than previous policies — although bullets were used as well to quell labour demonstrations.

The Zia years marked a dark age for labour. His insistence on the employers’ absolute right to hire and fire led to the virtual extinction of the tripartite system and his policy of allowing industrialists, traders, even rickshaw drivers, the full freedom to exploit people resulted in the unprecedented suppression of labour, a trend that non-military regimes (1988-1999) failed to reverse.

The Musharraf regime has broken all records in vicious hostility towards labour. Disregarding the recommendations of a tripartite conference, it issued the new IRO on Oct 29, 2002, which enlarged the ‘essential services’ where unions are not allowed (PIA, Railway, Pak Steel, local bodies, banks, Pak Mint, Export Processing Zones, agricultural workers et al).

The bar on unionisation by agricultural workers is absolutely scandalous as the ILO convention on their right to form unions was signed before independence. Further, this IRO abolished the labour appellate tribunals and extinguished workers’ right to reinstatement if their dismissal was proved wrongful. Then the Finance Bill was used to clip labour’s rights, a step liable to be challenged for being illegal and unconstitutional.

This brief survey is only meant to focus on the continuity of the anti-labour policy for decades. As a result of this policy, the trade union movement has been decimated. The ranks of bonded labour have swelled, the exploitation of child labour continues, the life of fisher-folk is getting more and more miserable. Pakistan’s conversion to the new faith of market economy has materially affected the labour force. The hordes not entitled to form unions are growing by the minute.

Can the state be allowed to ignore the rights of new ‘workers’? Will the state ever realise that the restrictions on workers’ rights are not ‘reasonable’ in terms of fundamental rights? Is the new government aware of Article 3 of the Constitution whereby the state has promised to abolish exploitation, take from everyone according to his capacity and to pay him according to his needs?

What is needed to heal labour’s wounds is known. A few weeks ago, a representative conference adopted a labour charter that will be supported by all workers and civil society. A lot that needs to be done is possible. The sooner Islamabad starts acting the better. However, far more important than offering labour concessions is the need to respect its rights and to accept the worker as the foremost creator of the nation’s wealth and a distinguished human being who must be restored to his place on the country’s highest podium.

MAY Day 2008 holds special significance as it is being celebrated amidst hopes and expectations by some and fears and anxiety by others. The incorrigible optimists, the trade unionists and labour rights activists see light at the end of the tunnel.

A charter of demand, put up through consultation and consensus of trade union bodies, representatives of national peasant and fisheries workers’ movements and civil society, has been forwarded to the newly elected government.

The Labour Charter 2008 asks the government to strike down restrictive clauses and introduce the long sought-after and much-awaited fundamental changes in labour laws to ensure basic rights, including the rights of freedom of association and collective bargaining, to all workers, inclusive of agricultural workers. Long overdue is the task to bring labour laws in conformity with the universal human rights declarations and the ILO conventions, many ratified by Pakistan over the decades.There is concern lest the government covers up the real issue given the ban on trade unions. Lifting the ban may help restore select trade unions but will not ensure the right of freedom of association to all the workers. It is also feared that the government may replace the IRO 2002 with IRO 1969. That would not be acceptable as the IRO 1969 took away the right of freedom of association, trade unionism and collective bargaining from a vast category of workers.

Labour rights activists had held a long struggle against IRO 1969 but the Musharraf regime put in place an even more repressive piece of legislation in the shape of IRO 2002. The IRO 2002 — imposed as a part of the Legal Framework Order and never discussed in parliament — excluded a larger number of workers and made registration of trade unions extremely difficult.

Further curbs on workers’ rights have been brought about through amendments in various labour laws, i.e 27-B of the Banking Companies Ordinance, 2-A of the Civil Servants Act 1973, and recently through the Finance Bill 2006 violating the procedures provided under the Constitution for amendments in any act of parliament. The Finance Act 2006 has given legal cover to certain exploitative working conditions prevalent in many workplaces: long working hours in general, late working hours for women in particular, and no compulsory closed weekly holiday.

Misconceptions and confusion prevail in the minds of many regarding labour legislation in general and legislative measures on trade unions in particular. Labour legislation in Pakistan is based on the legal framework drawn up by the British with the motive of ruling over their colony with an iron fist. The workers during the British Raj were subjected to extremely harsh conditions and exploitation which led to sporadic protests and strikes.

The British initiated legislation to control labour during this phase. Most of the colonial acts and amendments enacted by the British in 1850-1947 have, till today, remained part of the country’s labour code. Many others were amended several times, or had additional clauses inserted, or repealed. The trend in legislation by and large, however, has remained the same: regression towards restrictive, anti-labour laws during the last 61 years of the country’s history.

The fact that the laws were not re-formulated according to the emerging needs and aspirations of an independent country speaks a lot about us as a nation, and that includes our legislators and parliamentarians.

The crucial issue in many labour laws is their limited applicability or exclusion of large segments of workers. For instance, the Factories Act 1934, the Industrial and Commercial Establishments (Standing Orders) Ordinance 1968, Minimum Wage for Unskilled Workers Ordinance 1969, EOBI Act 1976, and Employees Social Security Ordinance, 1965, exclude agricultural and fisheries sector workers, home-based workers, domestic workers, resident immigrant workers, and many other sectors that fall under the informal economy. Lack of implementation of clauses that are beneficial to workers is the second major issue that can be attributed to poor governance and the powerful nexus between the employers, politicians and the state bodies.

The stakeholders on the other side of the fence, i.e. employers/industrialists, have, meanwhile, raised alarm as they equate, erroneously, the revival of trade unionism with a further slide in the economy. According to a recent statement by the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association spokesman, the revival of trade unions would be the final blow to the country’s already fragile economy. APTMA and other trade bodies holding a similar worldview seem to be totally out of sync with ground realities and emerging global trends.

Firstly, the unionised labour, which APTMA believes could and would wreak havoc on the country’s economy, has barely existed in the last six decades as a minuscule entity comprising just two to three per cent of the official 27 per cent of the country’s formal labour force. Out of this 27 per cent, or 13.5 million formal sector workers, according to the official data of 2002, only 138,456 workers were members of 1,202 trade unions in the country. The bulk of the labour force — 73 per cent — that is, 36.54 million workers, is not unionised.

Secondly, as validated by innumerable researches conducted in industrialised countries, production efficiency has a positive correlation with workers’ mental and physical wellbeing, among other factors. Also, adherence to labour rights is now being demanded by MNCs and the price for disobedience is heavy, unfortunately.The Nike Inc. cancelled its contract of hand-stitched footballs from a Sialkot vendor on labour rights violation in November 2006 causing loss of livelihood to 7,500 workers. The pressure is building up for corporate social responsibility and the companies’ code of conduct based on ILO core conventions (including the right of freedom of association) in many sectors, and textile and garments sector is on the top of the list, where international consumers and human rights campaigns are scoring gains.

It is high time all stakeholders, particularly the corporate sector, employers, industrialists, small- and medium-size entrepreneurs, and state bodies realised the importance of dignity and the worth of human labour and grasp the essential though fragile link between personal and national prosperity and a content work force that accesses basic rights for a decent and dignified living.

THE creative writing faculty of America’s Virginia Tech university has new guidelines for teachers to use when assessing students’ work.

“Is the work expressly violent?” they are asked. “Do characters respond to everyday events with a level of violence one does not expect, or may find even frightening? Is violence at the centre of everything the student has written?” Similarly, in colleges all across the US, teachers are now asked to inspect creative writing for violent tendencies and to guide authors of such work towards counselling and even medication.

It seems a strange response to creative work, especially if one considers contemporary British theatre. From the linguistic and emotional menace of Harold Pinter’s first plays to the infamous baby-stoning in Edward Bond’s Saved, from the anal rape in Howard Brenton’s The Romans in Britain to a soldier eating a journalist’s eyes in Sarah Kane’s Blasted, violence has often been a dominant theme on stage.

If written in a Virginia Tech class, these scenes might lead to me being counselled, or perhaps medicated. But these violent plays are an honest attempt to express the brutality of our “clash of civilisations”, of “jihad” and “the war on terror”, the white noise that fills our everyday lives.

I once taught playwriting for a semester in a Californian university. There was a bland pleasantness to the place; students delivered polite chatter-on-the-page as their playwriting assignments. A student with more abrasive work would have been welcome in my class. But maybe that would have been wrong. The Virginia Tech guidelines weren’t issued because of primness, but because of the events of April 16 2007 when a student, Cho Seung-hui, opened fire on campus, killing 33 people, including himself.

It emerged that the projects he had delivered in his playwriting class were full of verbal and physical violence. Asked to write a contemporary response to Hamlet, Cho produced Richard McBeef, in which a teenager accuses his stepfather of murdering his biological father and of abusing him. In front of a self-indulgent mother, the boy rams a cereal bar down the obese stepfather’s throat, before the stepfather batters him to death. The piece owes as much to Beavis and Butt-Head as it does to Shakespeare and has nothing like the high body count, madness and poison (or indeed philosophy) of the original play. It’s a violent cartoon, not a pathological shocker.

Maybe the journey to Cho’s shootings didn’t begin with his writing. Maybe being taken out of his class and given solo tutoring because other students found his work too threatening was an isolating act that helped turn him into a lone killer.

Maybe, as the Washington Post reported, his poetry teacher telling him he would have to drop out of her class if he didn’t change the type of poems he was writing pushed him closer to picking up the gun. And maybe the insistence, from another teacher, that he “write with another voice” was one more step in his transformation from an apparently troubled youth to a mass murderer.

Of course, encouraging students to write about violence in a habitual and lazy way would be wrong. There have been as many shallow, brutal plays on the British stage as there have been urgent, important ones. We have to be wary of violence as fashion. But to discourage all such writing is to curb a natural response to the world around us.

Young people are sensitive to the inequalities of our society, to the daily reports of the Iraq war and its futile violence. This will surely find its way into their work. We can’t tell them that only grown-up writers can use brutal words and imagery. Those of us working with young writers can help them to craft and contextualise violence, but we musn’t ask them to repress it. This would only increase any capacity for instability and lashing out.

It would stand as much chance of causing as it would of preventing future shootings. n

—The Guardian, London