Interim Report - Report No 272, June 1990

Case No 1499 (Morocco) - Complaint date: 06-JUN-89 - Closed

1. 445. In communications dated 6 and 28 June 1989 the Democratic Confederation of Labour (CDT) presented a complaint alleging violations of trade union rights against the Government of Morocco. The Government sent its observations in a communication dated 9 March 1990.
2. 446. Morocco has not ratified the Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87). However, it has ratified the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1949 (No. 98).

A. The complainant's allegations

1. 447. The Democratic Confederation of Labour (CDT) has presented a complaint alleging violation of the collective agreement governing the employment conditions and wages of workers in the Moroccan sugar-producing enterprises and alleging the dismissal of staff representatives in two sugar-producing enterprises, SUTA and SUCRAFOR.
2. 448. The CDT maintains that the employment conditions for workers in the sugar-producing enterprises are governed by the collective agreement concluded in 1975 between the Moroccan Federation of Labour and the sugar-refineries of Morocco, an agreement to which it adhered through the National Union of Sugar and Tea (SNST) on 13 July 1987. (Copies of the collective agreement and the notice of acceptance were supplied by the complainant organisation.)
3. 449. The CDT states that on 20 September 1987 the national SNST office sent the minister responsible for the sugar-refineries (the Minister of Trade and Industry) a letter reminding him of his commitments, undertaken during meetings held on 8 July and 14 September 1987, concerning the revision of the 1975 collective agreement and the wage scale in order to adapt wages to changes in the cost of living.
4. 450. According to the CDT, however, at the same time as the responsible minister had accepted that the 1975 collective agreement be revised, he was drawing up a draft agreement with the Minister of Finance which was concluded on 22 October 1987 and which applied retroactively from 1 January 1987. This minister had not consulted any of the staff delegates or any member of the SNST which, established in the country's 14 sugar-refineries, represents more than 80 per cent of the workers concerned. By this act he had disregarded the application of the 1975 collective agreement which was still in force, thus violating labour legislation, in particular Dahir No. 1-57-067 dated 17 April 1957 concerning collective labour agreements, and international agreements, in particular Convention No. 98. (A copy of the text of the draft agreement was supplied by the complainant organisation.)
5. 451. Furthermore, the CDT alleges that between 23 June 1981 and 20 July 1987 the management of the sugar-refineries SUTA and SUCRAFOR dismissed several staff representatives and trade union leaders.
6. 452. The CDT alleges that on 23 June 1981 Karib Lahcen, a worker at SUTA and a member of the CDT, was dismissed for having participated in the general strike of 20 June 1981 called by the CDT.
7. 453. On 16 June 1986 Atraoui Abderrahman was also dismissed. According to the complainant, the reasons for this dismissal dated back to 4 April 1986, when the SUTA trade union office addressed a list of claims to the management. A one-day strike took place on 20 May 1986 as a result of the management's refusal to negotiate. The success of the strike led the head of the district concerned to organise a management-union meeting which resulted in a draft agreement between the parties which the management later refused to observe. Another meeting took place between the staff delegates and the factory management. During that meeting Atraoui Abderrahman supposedly said that the use of redundancy threats on workers who maintained their claims was an obstacle to the work of the staff representatives. Two days later this worker was dismissed, and the staff delegates' and union's requests that the various competent authorities, including the responsible minister, examine this case have all gone unheeded.
8. 454. On 10 October 1986 El Yamani, the General Secretary of SUTA's trade union office and Mesnaoui Saïd, the staff delegate and a member of the SNST administrative committee were, according to the CDT, dismissed for having co-signed a report addressed on 21 August 1986 to the responsible minister and to the governor of the province of Beni Mellal outlining the true causes of the losses incurred by the company, in order to rebut the false allegations of the management which was trying to rid itself of several members of the staff. The steps taken by the CDT on the subject of these dismissals at all the ministries concerned have also gone unheeded.
9. 455. On 21 November 1986 Moustarih Abdelaziz, staff delegate, Assistant Secretary of the trade union office and member of the SNST administrative committee was in turn dismissed for having, according to the CDT, explained the reasons for the dismissal of the above-mentioned workers during a staff general meeting.
10. 456. Lastly, on 16 June 1987, five staff delegates - Mohammed Lahcen, Jad Bouzekri, Bouighjd Miloud, Bel Asri Hassan, Bel Filali Mustapha - were dismissed for having, during a meeting of staff delegates called on 14 June 1987, refused to denounce two articles published on 11 and 12 June 1987 in the opposition newspaper Al-Itihad-Al-Ichtiraqui (Nos. 1406 and 1407) concerning misappropriation and bad management at SUTA. Due to the CDT's unsuccessful interventions with the competent authorities concerning these redundancies, the dismissed workers went to the courts which, according to the CDT, have ordered that they be reinstated. However, SUTA's management refuses to comply with the judgements. In support of these allegations, the CDT has attached two copies of the decisions handed down in favour of workers Mesnaoui Saïd and Bouighjd Miloud.
11. 457. The CDT indicates that five trade union officers of SUCRAFOR - Mokhtar Ahmed, Chouaa Slimane, Hamdane Larbi, Belbakay Mohamed and Aïssaoui Mohamed - were dismissed for having boycotted the celebrations at the end of the sugar-beet season, a decision taken due to the inaction of the governor of the province and the provincial delegate of the Ministry of Labour after a request for intervention had been submitted to them to solve various problems within the enterprise. According to the CDT, in spite of the governor's oral instruction to proceed with the reinstatement of Hamdane Larbi and Belbakay Mohamed, the management initially refused to do so saying that the decision to dismiss them had been taken after consultation with the governor. Furthermore, the management offered Aïssaoui Mohamed his job back if he agreed to leave the union, a proposal which the worker did not accept. Lastly, the CDT indicates that applications made to the authorities, in particular to the responsible ministry, concerning these dismissals have remained unanswered.

B. The Government's reply

1. 458. In its reply dated 9 March 1990 the Government refers to a note from the Ministry of Labour concerning the dispute in the sugar-refineries, drawn up on the basis of information communicated by the Ministry of Trade and Industry.
2. 459. With regard to the allegation that the 1975 collective agreement was violated, the Government limits itself to a reminder that the agreement was signed in the name of the workers by the Moroccan Federation of Labour and that the agreement signed on 22 October 1987 did not undermine the established rights included in this collective agreement, but granted advantages in the following areas: wages and related payments; internal promotion; employment conditions; fifteenth month's pay; generalised employee participation in profit-sharing; the setting up of a special office to assist an employee's family in the event of his or her death.
3. 460. Regarding the second aspect of the complaint, the Government indicates that according to the employer's statements disciplinary measures were used in view of the serious errors committed by the employees in question, namely, revealing professional secrets, damaging tools and working instruments, committing acts of sabotage and being absent for no valid reason.

C. The Committee's conclusions

1. 461. The Committee notes that the CDT's complaint covers several issues: the refusal of the competent authorities to negotiate with the CDT, through the intermediary of the SNST, the employment conditions and the wage scale of workers in the sugar-refineries of Morocco who belong to this trade union; the Government's non-respect of a collective agreement; and the dismissals of staff representatives and trade union leaders due to their participation in trade union activities in the SUTA and SUCRAFOR sugar-refineries.
2. 462. With regard to the first point, the Committee notes, on the basis of the documents transmitted to it, that on 1 May 1975 a collective agreement was concluded between the Moroccan Federation of Labour and the Moroccan sugar-refineries for an unspecified period of time governing the employment conditions and the wages of workers, supervisors and trainers. It also contains provisions regulating denunciation, revision and membership.
3. 463. The Committee also notes that the CDT, through the SNST, became a party to the agreement following SNST's membership on 13 July 1987 and that as such the SNST had the right to participate in the revision of workers' employment conditions and wages, in accordance with the provisions of the collective agreement. It availed itself of this right by addressing to the competent authorities on 20 September 1987 a request to participate in negotiations between the Minister of Finance and the responsible minister aiming to revise the collective agreement. However, the responsible minister did not respond to this request and on 20 October 1987 concluded with the Minister of Finance an agreement unilaterally fixing the employment conditions and wages of the workers in the national sugar-refineries.
4. 464. The Committee notes that the Government does not deny the SNST's adherence to the 1975 collective agreement or the request which was addressed by said trade union to participate in the revision of the employment conditions and wages of workers in the sugar-refineries.
5. 465. This being the case, the Committee is of the opinion that the procedure followed by the competent authorities to regulate the employment conditions and wages of the workers of the national sugar-refineries who are members of the SNST constitutes, for these workers, a denial of the right to bargain collectively through their representatives, in this case the SNST, their employment conditions and their wages, and is contrary to the principle of free collective bargaining between social partners recognised in Convention No. 98.
6. 466. The Committee thus draws the Government's attention to the fact that the workers covered by Convention No. 98 - such as the sugar-refinery workers who are the subject of the present case - should be able to negotiate their employment conditions and wages through their representatives. To this end, the competent authorities are required to take all appropriate measures in keeping with national conditions to encourage and promote the most far-reaching development and use of the procedure of voluntary negotiation of collective agreements between employers and employers' organisations, on the one hand, and workers' organisations, on the other, in an effort to regulate employment conditions in this way.
7. 467. Moreover, the Committee notes that according to the terms of article XVIII of the agreement the enterprise will apply either the corresponding labour legislation or the decisions of the general management approved by the Minister of Finance (to all points that are not specifically covered), and that whilst paragraph 3 of the preamble provides for the revision of the agreement, there is no indication that this revision should be carried out on the basis of negotiations between the parties to it. In the Committee's opinion these provisions seem to rule out all future possibilities of determining by way of collective bargaining the employment conditions and wages of workers in the sugar-refineries covered by the agreement, in contradiction of the above-mentioned principles.
8. 468. Concerning the cases of worker dismissal, the Committee deeply regrets that the Government has not provided more detailed information on this point.
9. 469. Regarding the cases of Messrs. Mesnaoui Saïd and Bouighjd Miloud, the Committee has studied the contents of the judgements handed down on 9 April 1987 and 28 July 1988 respectively by the court of first instance of Beni Mellal, ordering the reinstatement of these workers. It notes in particular from the preambles of the decisions that the courts found no evidence to support the employer's claim that professional secrets had been divulged, and drew attention to the non-respect of legal procedures relating to the dismissal of staff representatives from the enterprise.
10. 470. Bearing in mind the CDT's allegations concerning the non-execution of these judgements by the SUTA undertaking, and in the absence of information on this point from the Government, the Committee requests the Government to secure the reinstatement of the workers concerned and to provide information in this connection.
11. 471. The Committee notes that the Government has not denied the CDT's assertion that the other dismissed workers all occupied positions as staff representatives or trade union delegates. In these circumstances, the Committee requests the Government to provide information on the conclusions reached by the labour inspectorate official who, in accordance with section 12 of Dahir No. 1-61-116 of 29 October 1962 on workers' representation in undertakings, has to make a recommendation, indicating the grounds on which his recommendation is made, in the event of the dismissal of a workers' representative. It also requests information on all other measures taken by the competent authorities to settle these disputes, in particular by the services of the minister responsible for the the sugar-refineries.
12. 472. The Committee notes that it has been seized in the past of several cases against Morocco (see, in particular, 208th Report, Case No. 1017, paras. 392-403; 214th Report, Cases Nos. 992 and 1018, paras. 80-92; 230th Report, Case No. 1116, paras. 65-84) concerning allegations of dismissal of staff representatives due to trade union activity. It reiterates that it has always stressed, where there is insufficient national legislation, the need to adopt specific provisions accompanied by sufficiently dissuasive civil remedies and penal sanctions to guarantee adequate protection against all acts of anti-union discrimination by employers, in accordance with Article 1 of Convention No. 98. In these circumstances, the Committee can only request the Government once again to adopt specific provisions in this area and draws the attention of the Committee of Experts on the Application of Conventions and Recommendations to this aspect of the case.
13. 473. Furthermore, having studied the draft Labour Code communicated by the Government in December 1988 in the context of the Committee of Experts' examination of its report on the application of Convention No. 98, the Committee notes that it contains provisions guaranteeing the application of Article 1 of Convention No. 98. The Committee therefore urges the Government to take the necessary steps so that these provisions are adopted in the near future.

The Committee's recommendations

1. 474. In the light of its foregoing interim conclusions, the Committee invites the Governing Body to approve the following recommendations:
   • (a) Noting that in 1987 the competent authorities drew up an agreement regulating the employment conditions of workers in the national sugar-refineries without consulting or negotiating with the representatives of the workers concerned, in this case the SNST, whereas a collective agreement concluded in 1975 still covered the workers belonging to the SNST, the Committee draws the Government's attention to the fact that this procedure constitutes a violation of the principle of free collective bargaining of employment conditions and wages.
   • (b) Considering furthermore that the agreement seems to rule out the use of collective bargaining in the future as a way of setting the conditions of employment and wages of the workers concerned, the Committee requests the Government to adopt measures to re-establish, in the future, voluntary negotiation procedures for establishing employment conditions and wages in the national sugar-refineries, in accordance with the principle of voluntary negotiation set out in Article 4 of Convention No. 98. The Committee draws the attention of the Committee of Experts on the Application of Conventions and Recommendations to this aspect of this case.
   • (c) As regards the cases of dismissal of workers of the SUTA and SUCRAFOR enterprises, the Committee, in the light of the judgements handed down ordering the reinstatement of staff representatives, namely Messrs. Mesnaoui Saïd and Bouighjd Miloud, requests the Government to keep it informed of the steps taken to ensure that these decisions are implemented, particularly in view of the CDT's allegations, which were not denied by the Government, concerning the refusal by the management of these enterprises to execute these judgements.
   • (d) Moreover, the Committee deplores the lack of detailed information on the other cases of dismissal of staff representatives in these enterprises. It requests the Government to provide information on the conclusions reached by the labour inspection official who, in accordance with national legislation, must make a recommendation, indicating the grounds on which his recommendation is based, in the event of the dismissal of workers' representatives from an enterprise and on all steps taken by the competent authorities to settle conflicts, in particular by using the services of the minister responsible for the sugar-refineries.
   • (e) The Committee recalls the need to ensure by specific provisions accompanied by civil remedies and penal sanctions the protection of workers against acts of anti-union discrimination at the hands of employers, in accordance with Article 1 of Convention No. 98; in the absence of such provisions in the national legislation, the Committee urges the Government to adopt legislative or other measures in the near future to ensure the application of this provision in Convention No. 98. The Committee draws the attention of the Committee of Experts on the Application of Conventions and Recommendations to this aspect of this case.