According to the International Transport Workers\u2019 Federation (ITF), workers represented by ITF-affiliated General Union of Port Workers (GUPW) went on strike last week over contract changed and ACT\u2019s failure to negotiate a collective bargaining agreement due since July \u2013 information APMT says is \u201cmisleading, incorrect and not supported by facts\u201d.<\/p>\n
Things are said to have turned sour soon after the strike began when police raided the protest and arrested 150 workers, including the union\u2019s leaders. Despite this, the union says it maintained its strike and has now \u201cwon\u201d its case, including the company\u2019s waiving all penalties imposed during the strike, in particular withdrawing 23 sackings, and a renewed commitment from the Jordanian government to have its grievances addressed by the national labour court.<\/p>\n
Peder Sondergaard, CEO, APMT Regional, said: \u201cClearly, the ITF has not received accurate information from its affiliate organisation in Jordan. This is counterproductive and results in delays to the regional transportation hub of Jordan and global supply chains.\u201d<\/p>\n
After ACT and GUPW failed to come to an agreement over a new collective labour agreement, the case was referred to the Ministry of Labour for the formal mediation and arbitration process. APMT says the ruling is expected soon and it will \u201crespect and follow the decision\u201d made.<\/p>\n
Since the unions and employers cannot agree, the process has entered a \u2018time out\u2019, during which time, neither the unions nor the employer has the right to take industrial action.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe strike was premature and illegal especially when held during a formal mediation process \u2013 which cannot be interpreted as a union victory,\u201d Mr Sondergaard added.<\/p>\n
APMT also says the ITF has falsified the reports of 150 arrests and dismissals, stating that the information is \u201cnot factually correct\u201d.<\/p>\n
Now, ACT has signed a memorandum of understand with the local GUPW whereby they have agreed to return to work and respect the formal process already underway.<\/p>\n
ACT is a joint venture between the Aqaba Development Corporation (ADC) and APMT and is the country\u2019s only container terminal, making it essential to Jordan and surrounding countries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
APM Terminals (APMT) says further delays to the regional transportation hub of Jordan, Aqaba Container Terminal (ACT), are expected following a \u201cpremature and illegal\u201d strike last week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":9160,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[],"sponsor":[],"class_list":["post-9159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle-east"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9159"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9159\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9161,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9159\/revisions\/9161"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9160"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9159"},{"taxonomy":"sponsor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sponsor?post=9159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}