Daddys Job Is My Future
The workers have been protesting the decision by not leaving the factory for the last nine days, since July 22.
The workers' children, who reside in different neighborhoods in Beykoz, Istanbul, gathered in the garden of an elementary school, where they boarded busses and went to Kristal-Is, the Turkish glass, cement and earth workers' union.
"200 children marching
Around 200 children aged four to 16, began marching towards the factory with banners that said, " Daddy's Job is my future," and, "Don't close down factories, don't expose children to hunger".
The police, who took tight security measures on the street, initially tried to prevent the children from marching, but then gave up.
The children, who shut the Sait Molla Street to traffic, continued to clap their hands and chant slogans as they reached the factory.
"The fathers are unemployed the children are hungry," chanted the children in front of the factory. Their fathers replied by chanting slogans like, "The fathers are proud of you".
Visits by Children and Workers were prevented
The police did not let the children to enter the factory. The workers served fruit juice to the children who gathered at a park opposite the street from the factory and who suffered from the heat. Later in the day, the children left the factory by busses.
Meanwhile, the workers who had signed a Collective Work Contract at the Beykoz Municipality earlier, came to support the protest at the factory.
However the police did not let the workers in. The administrators from the Limter-Is, the Union of Turkish dockyard workers, and Genel-Is, the Union of municipal workers, and the Beykoz Mayor Alalattin Cati, went to the factory to visit the protesting workers.
Ruling: There is No Incursion at the Factory
While the protest at Pasabahce is continuing, a verdict by an Istanbul court made them happy. The management of the Factory, had applied to court with claims that the workers occupied the factory, and demanded an investigation.
On the employer's demand, the legal justiceships conducted investigations at the factory Monday morning, and decided that there was no such incursion. The judgeship, that found that the workers were situated between the factory and the service building and not overflowing into the main street, also refused the employer's demand to listen to witnesses. (EÖ/BB/EA/NM)