Unions back May 1st removal from holiday list

Labour unions in Kosovo support Democratic Party MP Nat Hasani's proposal to remove International Workers' Day from the official holiday list 1 May.

Union representatives told BIRN they back MP Nat Hasani's initiative to remove some parties from the country's official list, including International Workers' Day.

Federation of Health Unions head Blerim Syla told BIRN that this initiative must first be approved by the Parliament of Kosovo, but argued that 1 May is a relic of the Yugoslav era.

“In most European countries this is not an official holiday and if our goal is to join Europe, this should be done in our country ... we have come from the former Yugoslavia's communist system and we were used to having a day off on 1 May”, Syla said.

He added that there should be no complaints about the change if that happens.

“We should have reactions to claim our rights, not for a day off,” he said.

Mursel Zymber, chairman of the Civil Service Union, said his organisation also supports the proposal, arguing that May 1st address more as a holiday since post-war, from the former system of former Yugoslavia”.

May 1 should be “more than a protest requiring workers' rights” and not a holiday, Zymber said.

Avni Aydin, chairman of the Union of Independent Trade Unions of Kosovo, also said that the fact that Kosovo marks May 1st as a holiday is “a bad syndrome that remains from the past”.

He also argued that 1 May should be a day of protest for workers' rights, such as “wage requirements, working conditions, health insurance, dignified pensions, maternity leave, and many other requests”.

A representative of Pristina's Anarcho-Sndicanist Group, which asked not to be mentioned by name, noted that 1 May was originally a memorial of a protest for workers in Chicago in 1886.

For us it doesn't matter whether it's an official holiday or not, we'll be on the street [surprising] ... it is really important for us to have a day dedicated to their workers and revolt”, he said.

The representative added that in the former Yugoslavia, the state portrayed itself as being humble of workers' rights, “but at the same time, Yugoslavia also violated workers' rights in various ways”.

He argued that this concept was inherited from Kosovo, but “now they want to remove it because there is a kind of ideological neoliberal dominance in which the worker... exists as an individual who has monetary value in the market economy”.

Such logic is very problematic, as is Nat Hasani's initiative,” he added.

International Workers' Day is a public holiday in Kosovo under the Law for Official Festivals. It is also a holiday in many other countries around the world, including all Balkan states.