January 13, 2006 Adana TEKEL workers crashed a TV program where the ruling party JDP (Justice and Development Party) representative spearheading the closure of their plant, Ziyaeddin Yağcı, was to appear in a live program. TEKEL is the state monopoly factory in Adana, producing tobacco products and is being planned to be shut down. Workers […]
January 13, 2006
Adana TEKEL workers crashed a TV program where the ruling party JDP (Justice and Development Party) representative spearheading the closure of their plant, Ziyaeddin Yağcı, was to appear in a live program.
TEKEL is the state monopoly factory in Adana, producing tobacco products and is being planned to be shut down. Workers in this plant in Adana have been struggling to keep their factory open. The workers who have been on continuous occupation of their plant stormed the local TV station to protest the Justice and Development Party’s representative who had been an outspoken critic of the publicly owned factory.
Wearing aprons that read, “TEKEL can not be closed” workers attempted to storm the studio where the representative was being interviewed live and demanded to participate in the discussion. The security guards and police blocked the workers from entering the studio, but the workers chanted slogans defending their workplace and its practices from closure.
Waiting half an hour after the workers were forced off the premise, representative Ziyaeddin Yağcı emerged from the TV station and said, “Everybody has a different angle on this issue. But it is a fact that the TEKEL factory is losing money. Due to our losses, all we want to do is to sell off the factory to a business owner to save the jobs of the workers. For us, the interests of 70 million people come before the interests of the 700 people here.”
Source: Atılım
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