INFOR October 2021: "Review of «three T» campaign: land, housing and work"
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Through the articles written by some movements, I would like to highlight the important work done by the forty and nine WMCW movements (affiliated and contacts) around the theme «Land, Housing and Work for a decent life».
This theme has found many echoes in all the continents and has strengthened our mission. We were also encouraged pope Francis’s words that, in the meeting of popular movements on 28th October, 2014, said: «There is a thing that every father, every mother wants for their children; an aspiration that should be at the reach for all, but which unfortunately it escapes it more and more to the most is: the land, the housing and the work. It is strange, but when I say this to some people, they tell that Pope is a communist. They do not understand that love to the poor is at the heart of Gospel. Land, housing and work, for which we fight, are sacred rights. Affirming that it is possible is the Social Doctrine of the Church».
And it is above on the basis of these sacred human rights that this INFOR issue presents testimonies about different ways of action around the right of Land, Housing and Work.
May 1st: Covid19 Lockdown And Its Impact On Workers
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Confinement due to Covid-19 began two years ago and in Uganda, after almost two years workers have experienced unspeakable stories of suffering and despair. Many workers have lost their jobs due to the long period of confinement and unemployment levels have risen.
Uganda was one of the countries with the longest lockdown period, from 1 April 2020 to January 2022, when the economy was fully reactivated. Informal entrepreneurs had no income during this period and had to dip into their own savings, rely on government food aid or seek help from family and friends to survive. This means that during the period of closure, most workers found themselves in a subsistence economy.
The conditions of confinement have affected almost all sectors of the labour market. The number of people employed in Uganda has declined from 9 million in 2016/17 to 8.3 million in 2019/20. This led to many wage earners losing their jobs. Other workers were forced to close their businesses.
Due to the unemployment situation in the country, even before the pandemic, Uganda used to export labour to the Middle East, especially to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. This was despite reports of poor working conditions. The number of Ugandan migrants has decreased from 25,363 in 2019 to 9,026 in 2020, due to the effects of the pandemic. This explains the extent of the impact of confinement on workers in Uganda and globally.
INFOR June 2021: "Telework and Digital Work"
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Do telework and digital work contribute really to a greater working freedom?
Not if the labour legislation remains being what it is, if trade unions are still at company doors, if workers are still persecuted by thinking differently, if the normal working day is not reduced, etc. In this context, teleworking from home can only mean more exploitation and greater subjugation of worker –and his family– to work.
In many places, due to the need to confine our professional activity in our living space, teleworking has been seen as a panacea for many evils, among them the difficulty of reconciling working and professional life.
New forces are transforming in the working world. COVID-19 pandemic has social and political consequences: a «virtualisation of human life» and a social control” has been established. The world as we knew was stopped at the beginning of 2020 and the governments, supporting by science, had to implement measures to save lives.
It is true that life goes on, but undoubtedly we have adopted the most unusual way of working of this generation. The challenge for policy makers is how to remain protecting people’s life and health without, at the same time, causing any irreversible damage to the economy.
WMCW Message For Womens' Day: "The Challenge Of Going On Caring The Threads Of Life"
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International Women’s Day, that has its origin in a tragical event on 8th March in 1908, we receive it again in 2022 in the midst of a health pandemic which has wreaked havoc in the economies and societies in the world and, at the same time, it has showed us the structural inequalities in the development in all areas of our lives.
In this particular time of crisis, women have been at the frontline inside and outside the home. In the private sphere, more than three times the hours of unpaid care work already fell on their backs, the pandemic increased them; and, in the social sphere, their role has been essential in running the soup kitchens, the neighbourhood self-organising, the health promotion, in the neighbourhoods, even when the personal resources and institutional capacity have been limited and the rights recognized, have also been threatened. Despite this work by women, social and protection systems were broken up and calls for help, complaints of violence and the sexual abuse have increased. Women were left at the expense of domestic violence in conditions of greater vulnerability, taking place a rise of feminicides as the cruellest expression against them.
