Labor rights | 250 resisting workers dismissed from warehouse of Migros market chain

* Photo: DGD-SEN

Click to read the article in Turkish

Protesting in the face of an 8-percent pay rise, 250 workers of the Migros Depo, the warehouse of Turkey's one of the largest supermarket chains, have been dismissed. The dismissed workers are also the members of the Warehouse, Port, Dock and Maritime Workers Union (DGD-SEN).

Sharing the news with a message on its social media account yesterday (February 9), the DGD-SEN briefly said, "Today, our fellow workers who were shown to be on administrative leave and were inside the warehouse have been dismissed because of solidarizing with our fellow dismissed workers at the door. Migros has dismissed our 250 fellow workers."

Halting work in protest, the workers of the Migros Depo were waiting inside the warehouse in İstanbul's Esenyurt as part of their strike action the other night when the police stormed the warehouse and detained three executives of the DGD-SEN and over 150 workers. The detained people were released from the Kıraç Police Station later in the day.

'Our call is to people: Hear our voice'

Making a statement about the recent dismissal of 250 workers from the Migros Depo, DGD-SEN Chair Neslihan Acar has said:

"We halted work seven days ago. We said, 'We cannot make a living on minimum wage; we cannot pay our rents and bills. We cannot lead a dignified life. We want a pay rise for this reason.'

"We did not want such extremely high figures. We said, 'May we at least pay a bill of 600-700 lira with the pay rise we get.' We said, 'May we buy bread and milk for our hourly wage.' We did not want such extreme figures that could not be afforded by Migros.

"When our fellow workers came here in the morning, kept on resisting and shouted inside the warehouse, our friends inside who were not dismissed, who were on an administrative leave have been dismissed as well. Today, nearly 250 workers were dismissed at one night.

"The workers demanding their daily bread are now deprived of it as well. We know this force, we know this obtrusiveness. Today, workers not only at Migros, but all across Turkey have been resisting this force, this obtrusiveness. This is our call to you; we do not have a call to the bosses. This is our call to the people here. Hear the voice here.

"We did not have anything else than the wages of slavery. May Migros think about it now, may Özilhan think about it now. We, with 20 workers, made his house unbearable for Özilhan. We, with 300 workers, will make the entire country unbearable for him!"

Workers' requests

Halting work since February 3, the workers of Migros Depo demand that their net hourly wages be increased by 4 Turkish Lira (TRY), the payment of premiums be legally guaranteed and the necessary measures be taken for labor health and safety. (AÖ/SD)