History of Migrant Workers Trade Union

Members of the Alliance of Migrant Workers in Korea stage a rally to demand work permission in Seoul, Sunday. Nearly 300 foreign and Korean workers denounced the government’s crackdown aimed at deporting foreign workers who had overstayed their visas. / AP-Yonhap

This is the last in a series of articles that cover the situation of migrant workers in South Korea. The past 3 articles have covered the history of and legislation concerning migrant labor and the difficulties migrant workers face in Korean society. This article covers migrant workers organizing, focusing on the Seoul-Gyeonggi-Incheon Migrants’ Trade Union (MTU). _ ED.

By Wol-San Liem
Special to Korea Times

Organized efforts by migrant workers to improve their situation began in the mid-1990s will voluntary protest against the industrial trainee system, under which migrants worked for well under minimum wage without basic labor rights.

In January 1995, 13 Nepalese trainees staged a sit-in protest at the historic Myongdong Cathedral in downtown Seoul, demanding, “Do not hit us, do not swear at us!”

Again in 1996, migrant workers held a sit-in protest at the cathedral, calling for guarantee of workplace accident compensation and the payment of back-wages.

In the process of these actions, religious and civil society organization became sympathetic to the plight of migrant workers and eventually came to the agreement that the law had to be changed in order to ameliorate the problem.

These organizations formed a coalition, called the Joint Committee for Migrant Workers in Korea (JCMK). Through the work of JMCK, the situation of Korea’s migrant workers became widely known in Korean civil society.

Migrant workers first became directly involved in unionism in May 2001 through the establishment of the Migrants Branch of the Equality Trade Union.

The activities of this union branch, which included campaigns for improvements in the wages and working conditions of trainees and migrants working under the Employment Permit System (EPS), culminated in a year-long sit-in protest at the cathedral from Nov. 15, 2004, to Nov. 28, 2004, calling for fundamental revision of the law on migrant workers and an end to crackdown and deportation of undocumented migrants.

It was out of this struggle that the Seoul-Gyeonggi-Incheon Migrants’ Trade Union, the first union founded by and for migrant workers in South Korea and one of the few of its kind throughout the world, developed.

MTU was founded on April 24, 2005, by migrants who had been involved in previous organizing efforts. Its membership is composed of migrants from Bangladesh, Nepal, Vietnam, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Indonesia, the majority of whom are undocumented.

Despite frequent crackdowns and deportations, MTU maintains a membership of roughly 300. Its basic goals are to 1) stop the crackdown and deportation of migrant workers, 2) achieve legalization of all undocumented workers, 3) achieve protection of the labor rights for migrant workers, 4) achieve a fundamental revision of the law concerning migrant workers.

MTU faces a variety of significant challenges that other unions do not have to confront. These included the multiple languages and cultures of its constituents, which make communication difficult and the temporary nature of migrant labor, which means an inevitable turnover in membership.

In addition, MTU has faced consistent challenge from the South Korean government, which has yet to acknowledge MTU’s official union status, claiming that undocumented migrant workers do not have the right to form a labor union, and has taken various steps to stop the union’s activities, including the arrest and year-long detention of MTU’s first President Anowar Hussain immediately after MTU was established.

When its application for union status was first rejected by the Ministry of Labor, MTU appealed the decision based on the claim that labor law, which gives all workers the right to organize, is separate and distinct from immigration law, which governs work and residence permits.

The ministry’s decision was first up-held by a district-level court, but then overturned by the Seoul High Court on Feb. 1 of this year, who agreed with MTU’s claim that undocumented migrants have the right to form labor unions.

Since then, the ministry has appealed to the high court, which has yet to deliver a decision. In the meantime, MTU has continued its activities despite the many barriers it faces, and is currently organizing a campaign against the joint-crackdown, which began on Aug. 1.

One of the most important parts of MTU’s work is a campaign to transform the EPS into a work permit system.

It is MTU’s position that this EPS does not sufficiently protect the human and labor rights of migrant workers because it ties migrants to their employers, limits residence terms to three years and prohibits migrants from bringing their families to Korea.

According to MTU, a work permit system that would allow migrants to stay in Korea for up to 10 years, guarantee their freedom to choose employers and provide various other social protections, is key to reducing the high number of undocumented workers.

This is because migrants flee from the current system where they face low-wages and human rights violations or overstay their visas because it is not possible for them to make enough many to repay debts and support families in the short three years currently allowed.

Migrants would not need to become undocumented, if the system were changed to provide them decent working conditions.

MTU is working with other labor and civil society organizations to make the implementation of the work permit system feasible.