More than 70 mines shut down by workers demanding back pay (07/14/96)

More than 70 mines shut down by workers demanding back pay

by Marta Kolomayets
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - With thousands of miners throughout Ukraine striking to demand unpaid wages - in some cases from as far back as February - and more than 70 mines at a standstill, government officials scrambled to find funds to repay them.

Although the first installments of the backlogged wages were trickling into western Ukraine's Ukrzakhidvuhil in Chervonohrad on July 10, miners in the Donetske region began blocking the railroads leading into this industrial city, demanding the millions of dollars of wages owed them.

President Leonid Kuchma on July 10 told Volodymyr Shcherban, the head of the Donetske Regional Administration and a deputy in Parliament, that there could be no special government emission of funds to pay the miners. He said that everything possible was being done to settle the problem, but did not disclose any details.

Presidential press secretary Dmytro Markov told Interfax-Ukraine that President Kuchma has addressed a request to U.S. President Bill Clinton, German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and leaders of international financial organizations to urgently grant credits to help improve the situation in the coal industry, including payment of back wages.

That same day President Kuchma's chief of staff, Dmytro Tabachnyk, and National Security Adviser Volodymyr Horbulin met with ambassadors of the G-7 countries to Ukraine to inform the diplomats not only of the positive trends in Ukraine's economy, but also to express their concern over the growing volume of wage arrears.

In the course of the meeting, reported Interfax-Ukraine, it was noted that the president and the government are taking a number of preventive measures to ease social tensions; these measures were not defined, however.

One source close to the presidential administration noted that Ukrainian officials will seek aid from international financial organizations and governments of the G-7 countries to overcome the payments crisis in Ukraine.

But it may take days, if not weeks, for these problems to be resolved. In the meantime, miners from the Donetske region, where 42 coal enterprises are striking, since July 3 have been blocking main thoroughfares into the city.

On July 11 they began staging sit-ins and felling trees from the nearby forests to block railroad tracks leading into this industrial city. Interfax-Ukraine reported that thousands of people were stranded at the railway station, sweltering in the scorching sun.

As The Weekly was going to press, miners in Luhanske and Krasnodon were planning similar strike measures and a blockade of the railway.

According to Serhiy Raspopov, a member of the Donetske miner's committee, the decision to block the railway was made after the strikers received news on July 10 that they would be paid for June, but no solution was reached on back wages, which for some miners includes four to five months of salary.

The leader of the United Independent Railroad Workers' Union, Semen Karikov, sent a telegram to the Donetske miners expressing support for their demands.

The miners' strike committee in Donetske calls meetings every night to decide on the type and duration of protest. They have made it clear they have no political demands, only economic: to be paid out what is owed them.

According to Mykhailo Krylov, a co-chairman of the Donetske City Strike Committee, government negotiations with coal miners have failed. "There is no sense in meeting with the government, if it has no money to pay overdue wages," he said, explaining that this is the strikers' main demand. The committee is willing to negotiate on other issues, including pension and disability benefits, he said.

Newly appointed Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko was instructed by President Kuchma to go to the Donetske region next week to conduct a detailed study of the situation and take radical measures to resolve the crisis. Mr. Lazarenko said his approach would be to investigate each mine situation separately, and look into the non-payment for coal shipped to commercial companies.

Some government officials, including Coal Industry Minister Serhiy Polyakov, blame local officials for the delay in the payment of wages to miners and accuse management of mining enterprises of delaying the salary disbursements.

Serhiy Teleshun, President Kuchma's domestic policy adviser, recently said he is convinced the state paid out all the money due to the coal miners. He said that now the miners should turn to the commercial entities that sell coal, for they are the ones who owe the industry money.

Vasyl Yevtukhov, who served as the deputy prime minister for the fuel and energy complex until his resignation last week, said the miners have not been paid because money allocated to them was "circulating in other structures."

Indeed, there are currently 10 court proceedings against mining association directors who are accused of embezzling money. And a government commission headed by First Deputy Prime Minister Vasyl Durdynets earlier this year found that 750 billion karbovantsi (over $4 million) earmarked for the coal industry in 1995 and 1.5 trillion karbovantsi (over $8 million) in 1996 never made it to that energy sector. Mr. Durdynets is currently in the Donbas investigating the problems in the industry.

By the end of June, the Ukrainian government owed the miners over 93 trillion karbovantsi or over $510 million (U.S.). As The Weekly was going to press close to 8,000 miners were staging a strike, resulting in a loss of 75,500 tons of coal output per day for Ukraine.

| Home Page |