Millions march on May Day

By John Catalinotto
and
G. Dunkel

May 7, 2008

May Day, or International Workers' Day, was celebrated with marches, combative demonstrations and sometimes open struggles all over the world. In the non-imperialist world, these actions focused on the great increase in food prices in recent weeks, in Europe on defending jobs and workers’ wages. In both Europe and the United States, immigrant rights were up front. In the U.S. longshore workers held a rare political strike against war on the West Coast.

May Day in Manila, Philippines.

It was bound to be a day of struggle. In the Spanish state the call read clearly: “For us May 1 is an international day of working-class struggle. For this we will demonstrate to demand that the capitalists should pay for the crisis.”

In Senegal, the Union of African Workers called for the “unavoidable struggle” with the government of President Abdoulaye Wade, urging the workers and people to throw the current government out.

While not an exhaustive report on every action worldwide, the actions listed below give a sense of the breadth of May Day struggles.

In the West Bank city of Bethlehem in Palestine, hundreds of demonstrators protesting the Israeli-constructed Separation Wall heard Dr. Mustafa al Barghouti, secretary general of the Palestinian National Initiative, denounce Israel’s procedures that attempt to prevent the Palestinians from conducting any peaceful demonstrations. He said, “Such procedures will not intimidate us. ... [T]he Palestinians are stronger, and the ones that deserve to live freely and in dignity on the land of their fathers and ancestors.”

Immigrants lead May Day in Paris.

In Paris, France, the two largest union confederations, the CFDT and the CGT, marched jointly for the first time in five years. Throughout France, there were 150 marches involving 200,000 people under the general slogan, “Wages, protection against inflation, for jobs, retirement and peace!”

In Paris, the CGT invited the undocumented workers—mostly from Africa—who have been on strike for legalization since April 15 to march at the front of their contingent. Francine Blanche, a CGT leader who has been coordinating the strikes, said “Who better than workers in France without papers to illustrate the Day of Labor and international solidarity?”

In Havana, Cuba, hundreds of thousands of workers marched, again this year without the presence of Fidel Castro. The main speaker was Alvador Valdés, the current president of the Workers Center of Cuba (CTC), the union confederation. Valdés reaffirmed the decision of the Cuban workers to continue on the path of Fidel, “the path to an ever more just, human and efficient socialism.”

In Caracas, Venezuela, thousands of members of the National Workers Union (UNT) chanted, “Chávez, homeland or death!” as they marched to demand higher wages. On April 30 Chávez had signed a decree raising the minimum wage by 30 percent to $372 a month, which he called “the highest in Latin America.”

The biggest open clashes between a repressive capitalist state and demonstrating workers took place in Istanbul, Turkey, this year. The regime arrested 530 demonstrators and used tear gas bombs against a half-million demonstrators in the capital. Their “crime” was in trying—this time unsuccessfully—to demonstrate in Taksim Square, where the police had killed 37 people on another May Day in 1977. The authorities also used tear gas, and arrested 96 people, in Santiago, Chile, where 20,000 people were demonstrating.

At a May Day meeting in Durban, South Africa, the S.A. Communist Party chairperson Gwede Mantashe said, “The [higher] food prices make the availability of a plate [of food] every night almost a luxury rather than a right and are a reflection of a system that puts profits before people. The oil prices ... are a reminder that the international rules are meant for the poor nations.”

Workers across Asia focused on a campaign against high food prices in their May Day marches through cities including Manila, Philippines; Jakarta, Indonesia; and Bangkok, Thailand.