Daily Times

The recent PIA strike was a monumental episode in the history of industrial struggles by the workers in this country when all of Pakistan International Airlines’ (PIA’s) operations including flights, cargo and ticketing offices were brought to a grinding halt for eight days in every city and town that has PIA offices, airports and facilities. Such was the pressure from below that the pilots’ association (PALPA) joined the strike and refused to fly the aircraft.

However, the leadership of the Joint Action Committee (JAC), led by its chairman, Sohail Baloch, unilaterally and suddenly called off the strike on February 9. Baloch said, “A kind friend advised us to call off the strike” and requested all airline workers to work with full dedication and pay no heed to anyone trying to disrupt flight operations. He went on to say a meeting had been scheduled between the JAC and Shahbaz Sharif the following day to address outstanding issues. When asked by the press if the JAC had retracted from its demands, Baloch said he would inform the media about developments after the meeting with the Punjab chief minister. These words and actions of the JAC are nothing but total capitulation and weakness of the petit bourgeois leaders who never believed in class struggle and had failed to mobilise the workers of other industries and services sectors. This incident once again proves the vital role of the leadership and its political and ideological orientation.

After the first two days of this all out strike, pressures started to mount on the striking workers. The first cracks appeared on February 7 when a PIA flight succeeded in taking off from Islamabad for Jeddah. Once flights began leaving Islamabad airport, it was becoming relatively easy for the government to convince other stations to resume flight operations. “Pilots who were working as part of ground crews were asked to take flights and, once that happened, other cities were told to follow suit,” a senior PIA official told the press.

Divisions between pilots, ground staff and other PIA employees, and a clear strategy of targeting the most militant PIA workers and unions, in particular the People’s Unity activists, also played a part in helping the management resume flight operations from Islamabad much faster than other airports. An administration official speaking on condition of anonymity said that local Air League leaders, the CBA union affiliated to Nawaz’s party, had been in touch with the district administration throughout the strike and had worked to encourage PIA employees of middle grades to cross the picket lines. Unsurprisingly, the first betrayals came from the pilots’ union. PALPA President Amir Hashmi said in a television interview: “Pilots have not been on strike. They were a part of the protest from the beginning but never supported the idea of a complete strike.” He undermined the bold steps of those pilots who had refused to fly after the shooting at Karachi airport.

However, the strike remained firm despite threats and intimidation by the regime. Only 20 percent of the staff came back on duty by Monday despite the government’s best efforts to restart flight operations. Every tactic was used including offering money, promotions, perks and providing protection to strike breakers with Elite Force commandos. Access to sympathetic journalists and media was denied. This is the real face of this ‘democratic’ government, exposing the real character of Pakistan’s bourgeois democracy. The Sharifs and their party are in reality the inheritors of the brutal legacy of the atrocious dictator Ziaul Haq. It was General Gilani, Zia’s governor and martial law administrator of Punjab in the 1980s, who first brought Nawaz Sharif into politics.

The Sharif government, though extremely nervous and shaky, left no stone unturned to undermine the strike and PIA workers. First it imposed the Essential Services Maintenance Act 1952, thereby declaring the strike illegal. Then it picked up four union leaders in the middle of the night and instructed the police and Rangers to be ruthless towards protesting workers, resulting in the killing of three PIA workers and serious injury to many. Airhostesses and female workers were harassed and police vans were deployed outside the homes of several employees. These were acts of intimidation to force thePIA workforce to go back to work. While the Sharifs postured aggressively in front of the media, behind the scenes Punjab Chief Minister (CM) Shahbaz Sharif dispatched his son Hamza to Karachi to prepare the grounds for the JAC leaders to capitulate. However, the isolation of the strike and the wavering of the leaders brought demoralisation to the striking workers.

After calling off such a bold and courageous strike, the JAC leaders flew into Lahore from Karachi to have a late night meeting with CM Shahbaz Sharif. The meeting with Shahbaz was a total farce as he only agreed to forward the demands of the JAC to his brother. To rub salt on the wounds, under the direct instructions of the government, the PIA management began the process of firing the ‘main characters’ of the strike; to date at least 165 PIA workers are facing the axe for their active role in the week-long flight suspension of the national flag carrier as the government appears to be in no mood to pardon them.

The isolation of the strike and failure of the JAC leaders to broaden the struggle by linking up with workers and their unions in other state owned organisations (SOEs) like Railways and the Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) and workers in the private sector, enabled the government to use its muscle, money, the state and its puppet CBA union Air League in the PIA to undermine the strike. This PIA strike was a struggle against the stream as the prevalent mood in the country has been paved in favour of privatisation.The number one lesson for workers is the need to have learnt the lesson of the necessity of forging a united union that can be trusted, with its leaders having a firm belief in class struggle and the historical obsolete and reactionary nature of the capitalist system. It is crucial for any strike to mobilise the workers of other industries and youth, and support of the masses to decisively win these battles of the class war.

This is a setback, but its impact will be temporary and superficial. The prevalent inertia in society cannot last very long. The strike proved that even in most difficult periods the workers can rise and fight the system and state. Workers have the power to bring aeroplanes, ships, trains, buses as well as electricity, communication networks, production and ultimately the whole of society to a halt by jamming the wheels of industry and institutions. However, the most crucial lesson that the youth and workers can learn from this struggle and strike of the ‘lions led by donkeys’ is the need for a leadership that can fight to the finish and a revolutionary party that can smash the system and its state, and transform society.

The writer is the editor of Asian Marxist Review and international secretary of Pakistan Trade Union Defence Campaign. He can be reached at lalkhan1956@gmail.com