بيان تضامن مع إضراب العاملين في مديرية صحة درعا

Statement

A statement of solidarity with the strike of workers in the Daraa Health Directorate: Towards a workers’ uprising to end the policies of starvation and repression

We are following with great concern the arbitrary decisions affecting hundreds of workers in the Daraa Health Directorate, who have found themselves victims of harsh neoliberal policies aimed at dismantling the public sector and turning it into an arena of loyalty and favoritism, at the expense of competencies and basic services needed by the Syrian people.

The decision to dismiss 700 medical staff in the Daraa Health Directorate is only a new episode in a systematic attempt to impoverish and starve the Syrian people by targeting the livelihoods of workers and hitting the vital sectors that represent the last remaining lifeline in the country.

We emphasize that those who issue these decisions do not seek to reform or improve services, but rather to impose political and economic control over state institutions, turning them into tools to consolidate the reality of oppression and tyranny.

The policy of cutting livelihoods is aimed at bringing workers to their knees and silencing their voices, but it will lead to a hungry uprising that will not stop in Daraa, but will spark workers’ anger everywhere.

We call on workers in the Daraa Health Directorate and all other sectors to unite their efforts and coordinate their strikes and sit-ins in an organized labor movement that imposes its conditions on the authorities instead of begging them.

Confronting the policies of starvation and repression requires organizing independent trade unions and workers to put an end to these policies that are destroying people’s lives and threatening social peace.

It has become clear that the ruling authorities do not have a solution to the people’s crises, nor do they seek to feed the hungry or provide justice for workers, but rather starve and repress them to ensure their continued control over the country.

We affirm that the solution will not be through begging or waiting for the response of the de facto authorities, but through organizing and continuous pressure, until workers’ conditions are imposed in the management of public institutions and their stolen rights are restored.
Our unity and organization is the only weapon to regain our dignity and rights.

“We will not be silent about the right, nor will we give up on dignity”

The signatories:
Revolutionary Left Current in Syria
Communist Labor Party (Outside Organization)
Revolutionary Labor League
Democratic Labor Movement
Democratic Change Movement