Observation (CEACR) - adoptée 1995, publiée 83ème session CIT (1996)

The Committee notes the Government's report and recalls that its previous observations related to the following:

1. Right of workers, without distinction whatsoever, including seafarers, to establish and to join organizations. The Committee notes that the Government indicates in its report that the Constitution of 1992 recognizes the right of all workers, without distinction whatsoever, to form trade unions and adds that, since this is a basic text, the provisions are of general scope and apply to seafarers. The Committee, for its part, has read the text of the 1992 Constitution and observes with interest that section 31 indeed provides that the State recognizes the right of all workers to defend their interests by trade union action, and in particular by forming and joining a trade union freely. The Committee has already noted that national legislation gives seafarers certain rights relating to the right to organize (the right to conclude collective agreements to determine their wages, section 3.5.03 of the Maritime Code, as amended in 1966; the procedure for the collective settlement of disputes and the right to strike following an opposition to an arbitration award, Act No. 70-002 of 23 June 1970 respecting individual and collective disputes in the Merchant Navy and its implementing Order No. 3012-DGTOP/SSM of 1970). The Committee would be grateful if the Government would send in its next report the text currently in force of the Merchant Shipping Code (since the Labour Code in the process of being drawn up continues to exclude workers governed by the former (section 1)), thus permitting the Committee to determine whether the right to organize for seafarers is indeed recognized.

2. Requisitioning of persons. While noting that the Government indicates in its report that during the period covered by the report it has not exercised the right to requisition persons set out in Act No. 69-15 of 15 December 1969, the Committee nevertheless recalls that the conditions giving rise to the right to requisition persons have too broad a scope to be compatible with the principles of freedom of association. The Committee therefore requests the Government to contemplate amending its legislation, in particular sections 20 and 21 of Act No. 69-15, so that they authorize the Minister to resort to this procedure only to bring to an end a strike in essential services in the strict sense of the term, that is those whose interruption would endanger the life, personal safety or health of the whole of part of the population, or in the case of public servants exercising authority in the name of the State or in the event of a strike, the extent and duration of which are liable to give rise to an acute national crisis. The Committee requests the Government to keep it informed of the measures taken or envisaged in this matter.