The cracks in the trade union movement continue to grow wider and deeper, and the unity that they showed less than a month ago when they marched together in protest against the government’s proposed water and electricity bills has long been forgotten – if it ever existed in the first place.
The latest twist has come from the Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses, with two executive members resigning their post and joining up with others to try to obtain the required 25 per cent of signatures to convene an extraordinary general meeting to call for fresh administrative elections.
This confirms speculation that the MUMN administration did not have the full support of its members when it called industrial action last month, a call that was later withdrawn after it was agreed that the government and the union would hold talks on pending issues. Now that this split has appeared, one wonders whether the union called off its directives fearing that they would not have been followed to the letter by its members.
The former council members believe that the union has lost all its credibility as a result of the leadership it currently has, saying that directives that had been issued earlier by the MUMN were not followed as much as the union would like the public to believe.
The difficulties within the MUMN came after the Confederation of Malta Trade Union’s decision to suspend the affiliation of one of its members, the Malta Union of Teachers, after the latter failed to withdraw comments it made about the CMTU president and the leadership.
The decision was taken last Saturday, after the confederation and the MUT had traded rather harsh exchanges in the preceding days, making it clear that the clash that exists between top officials – in particular CMTU president William Portelli and MUT president John Bencini, himself a former CMTU president – will not be easy to heal.
It all boils down to the fact that the MUT called for a meeting to be held to seek the formation of a trades union council without previously referring the matter to the CMTU, which in turn said that the formation of a TUC was right now not a priority considering that the unions are still embroiled in the dispute with the government over the new water and electricity rates.
The MUT has in the meantime teamed up with 10 other unions, including the General Workers Union, in writing to the Prime Minister to consider revising the government’s position on the energy tariffs. The CMTU and the UHM have kept their distance from this, again exposing the differences of opinion that exist on the matter. The statement they issued yesterday (see page 2) says it all: the holding of hands on stage in Valletta on 14 November – when 20 unions held a protest march – was nothing more than a weak attempt at showing a unity that is just not there.
Of course, the MUMN internal dispute and the one involving the CMTU and MUT are completely different matters. But both issues are signals that cannot be ignored.
If these conflicts are allowed to escalate – and some would say that they have already escalated – the end result would be that the workers these unions represent are the ones who will suffer the most.
As for the setting up of a TUC, in the prevailing circumstances it is difficult to imagine that this is possible. The differences that have existed in the past have always made it hard for one to imagine that a TUC is an eventuality in Malta. Given what is taking place – with unions attacking each other and with the MUMN facing internal trouble it must resolve quickly – it becomes impossible.