Vol. 81/No. 26 July 17, 2017
Russian truckers continue strike, open
political campaign
The Carriers Union of Russia, the truckers’ organization, recently announced that Andrey Bazhutin, the union’s leader, will run for president of the Russian Federation in the March 2018 elections. The union says this will give a real choice to the working class, the part of society that “now is suffering most of all and is most tired of all about the critical situation” in the trucking industry and the industries it works with.
Bazhutin was interviewed by Open Russia after his campaign was announced June 14. They wanted to know how the union would finance it. “We have huge human resources,” he answered, “our co-workers, our friends and family, our comrades.”
There haven’t been any parties speaking for the working class in Russia for decades, he said. “Therefore we decided to act on our own.” We will speak not just for the truckers, he said, but for workers in education, in medicine and other industries, as well as farmers.
The long-haul truckers began their protests at the end of 2015, when the government established what’s called the Plato system. It imposes a toll equivalent to 4 cents per mile on trucks weighing more than 12 tons. Following protests by thousands of drivers, the government postponed implementing the toll until last March. When it did go into effect, truckers responded with a national strike. Since then more than 30,000 workers in 60 cities have joined the walkout for periods of time.
Strikers forced to return to work to feed their families have spread the word about the fight along their routes.
In the city of Engelsk in the southern Saratov region, truckers beat back a June 5 attempt by cops to break up a strike encampment they had set up.
President Vladimir Putin has refused to comment on the truckers’ demands. The transportation minister has refused to meet with them. Government-controlled media blacked out any coverage of the actions for the first three months, and now claims it has been a failure.
But their fight has become well-known. At the end of May, the governor of Astrakhan region met with strikers and agreed to take steps to meet their demands. A two-hour rally by 20 drivers June 3 on the Yekaterinburg ring road was covered by the media.
On Russia’s June 12 national holiday, protests against the government occurred in over 150 cities with tens of thousands participating. Called by anti-corruption campaigner Alexei Navalny, the actions became a rallying point for broader anger, as many workers face stagnating and unpaid wages, rising prices, and increasingly feel that politicians are not listening to ordinary people. Long-haul truckers joined in a number of cities. Of the more than 800 arrested in Moscow, 30 were drivers.
The truckers’ actions coincide with protests in the capital demanding an end to city government plans to tear down 4,500 apartment buildings, home to roughly 1.6 million people who would be moved elsewhere. The land occupied by these buildings, called Kruschevki, after the Soviet premier when they were built in the 1960s, has soared in value, and politically connected, profit-hungry housing developers now hope to cash in.
The largest protest to date — marked by the slogan “Renovation=Deportation” — took place June 18, with truckers participating.
Related articles:
Calif. cannery strikers ‘saw what we can do when we unite’
On the Picket Line
Workers in Virgin Islands face brunt of US colonial rule
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home