Definitive Report - Report No 94, 1967

1. 8. The complaint is contained in a communication dated 7 February 1966 from the International Federation of Christian Trade Unions and was communicated to the Government, which answered by a communication dated 29 August 1966.
2. 9. Panama has ratified the Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87), and the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1959 (No. 98).

A. A. The complainants' allegations

1. 10. The complainants allege that freedom of association has been violated in the city of David in the province of Chiriqui, to the detriment of the Union of Wage-Earning and Salaried Employees of the Slaughterhouse of David (Chiriqui), established at the end of November 1965. For no other reason than membership in the above-mentioned trade union, ten workers were unjustly dismissed, seven on 14 December 1965 and the other three at the beginning of January 1966.
2. 11. The complainants consider that these dismissals violate the Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87), and section 307 of the Panamanian Labour Code. They quote the text of that section, according to which members of industrial associations which are in the process of formation, members of the executive committees of existing industrial associations and other trade union representatives designated in the Code may not be dismissed, their conditions of employment may not be altered for the worse, nor may they be transferred to other establishments of the same undertaking or to a different municipality without the authorisation of the competent judge. This protection shall be extended for one year after the worker ceases to be a member of the executive committee or three months after he completes his period of service as a trade union representative.
3. 12. The Government attaches to its communication dated 29 August 1966 two reports concerning this case, communicated by the Ministry of Labour, Social Welfare and Public Health. It appears from these documents and the enclosures that on 22 December 1965, having been informed by a local inspector that the owners of the Chiriqui Slaughterhouse had dismissed a group of workers who were members of the trade union which was at that time being formed, the Inspector-General of Labour ordered the undertaking to reinstate them immediately in accordance with the provisions of section 307 of the Labour Code. At the same time the Inspector-General sent a telegram to the labour judge at David, denouncing the infringement and requesting him to take immediate steps to prevent the violation of workers' rights. In spite of the intervention of the General Labour Inspectorate and the labour judge the undertaking persisted in its attitude; the Inspector-General therefore repeated, in a telegram dated 28 December 1965, the order to reinstate the workers and pay the wages due to them. On that same day the Inspector-General informed the National Assembly, at the latter's request, of the steps taken.
4. 13. As the undertaking persisted in its attitude, seven workers who had been dismissed on 14 December 1965 took proceedings against their employer and won their case, proving, among other things, that at the time of their dismissal the undertaking's representative knew that they were members of the trade union then being formed. In the judgment dated 14 July 1966 the judge sentenced the undertaking to reinstate the seven workers mentioned and pay the wages due for the intervening period. With reference, however, to three other workers who had been dismissed on 27 December 1965 and had also brought an action against the undertaking, the judge concluded that their membership in the trade union then being formed was not known to the employer at the time of their dismissal; the judgment therefore absolved the undertaking from further responsibility. These three workers appealed against the judgment but failed to carry their appeal through, so that the Higher Labour Court declared the appeal invalid.
5. 14. The Government sent the complete text of the court rulings mentioned, with the reasons adduced therein and the text of a resolution dated 2 August 1966 by the Ministry of Labour, Social Welfare and Public Health, recognising the legal status of the Union of Wage-Earning and Salaried Employees of the Chiriqui Slaughterhouse.

B. B. The Committee's conclusions

1. 15. The allegations submitted to the Committee for examination do not appear to raise any points requiring examination in connection with the provisions of the Freedom of Association and the Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87), referred to by the complainants, but rather in connection with the provisions of Article 1, paragraph 2 (b), of the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1959 (No. 98), which has also been ratified by Panama. Under that Article the adequate protection which workers shall enjoy against acts of anti-union discrimination in respect of their employment shall apply more particularly in respect of acts calculated to cause the dismissal of a worker by reason of union membership or because of participation in union activities.
2. 16. In this case the Government has provided detailed information from which it appears that very soon after the first dismissals the authorities took steps to apply the provisions of national law that prohibit the dismissal of members of a trade union in the process of formation without the authorisation of the judge. The case having been submitted to the competent judge through the normal labour court procedure, judgments were delivered ordering the reinstatement of seven of the dismissed workers and the payment of the wages due to them since the date of their dismissal. Concerning the three other workers in question, the documents in the case do not show that their membership in the trade union in the process of formation had been notified within the required time to the representatives of the undertaking; having lost the case before the court of first instance, they did not carry through their appeal before the higher court.