Police intervention against Migros workers on the 100th day of their protest

Click to read the article in Turkish

A group of workers working at the warehouse of Migros, one of the biggest chains of supermarkets in Turkey, in Kocaeli joined the Warehouse Harbor Shipyard and Maritime Workers Union (DGD-Sen).

In response to this, they were first put on unpaid leave, then laid off with Code 29*, a legal way used by employers to dismiss workers despite the layoff ban amid the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

While the workers have been protesting for 100 days, they wanted to hold a press statement in front of the house of Tuncay Özilhan, the Chair of the Executive Board of Anadolu Group, which owns Migros.

Gathering in front of the house in İstanbul's Beykoz district, the dismissed workers were met with police intervention. The police did not allow the press statement to take place and detained several people.

In a statement released by the Health and Safety Labor Watch (İSİG), 14 people, including union executives, have been detained.

Addressing the police officers who threatened them with intervention before being detained, DGD-Sen Chair Murat Bostancı asked whether the law works differently for workers and employers.

Noting that the ban on meetings and demonstrations in front of Özilhan's house ended, Bostancı said, "A 15-day ban on meetings and demonstrations has been imposed again at the speed of light. But why aren't these laws enforced so quickly to pay the workers their compensation?"

Despite the prevention of the police, workers chanted the slogans, "Workers are here, where is Özilhan?"

"İşçiler burada, Özilhan nerede?"

Yine geleceğiz, kararlılıkla direnmeye devam edeceğiz.

Genel başkanımız, sendikamıza üye Migros depo işçileri, @insaatsendika ve @yasarustaportal'dan dostlarımızla birlikte gözaltına alındık.#MigrosaBoykotİyiGelecek pic.twitter.com/rh9WhZu54y
— DGD-SEN (@DGDSEN) April 14, 2021

*What is 'Code 29'?

In an article on daily Evrensel, Sevda Karaca explains the "Code 29" in following words:

"'Code 29', the legal 'exception' of the ban on dismissing workers during the pandemic has become the nightmare for the workers in Turkey.

"What is this Code 29?

"Employers have to give notice to the Social Security Institution within 10 days of the dismissal of a worker. The dismissed worker is given a code for the reason for dismissal on this notice. Code 29 shows that the employment contract had been terminated on the grounds that the employee exhibited 'behaviours that do not comply with the rules of ethics and goodwill' as listed in the second paragraph of Article 25 of the Labour Law.

"This article, which bosses used extensively during the ban to dismiss workers [during Covid] is also an obstacle to benefiting from unemployment benefits. İŞKUR (Turkish Employment Agency) looks at the code when an application for unemployment benefit is made; if code 29 is entered benefits are not paid. Those dismissed under the code 29 also cannot receive short-time work allowance.

"Code 29 is a brutal type of dismissal where the worker is not entitled to severance pay, notice pay and unemployment benefits."

(HA/SD)