Garment Workers Need Communism to Crush Brutal Wage Slavery
BANGLADESH, Jan. 30—A wave of violent strikes has swept the garment district of Dhaka, Bangladesh. Tens of thousands of workers walked out in the district of Ashulia, which makes clothes for western brands such as Zara, H&M, Gap and Walmart.
The strike was sparked when the bosses sacked 121 workers for demanding higher wages. Soon the entire garment industry was shut down. The bosses unleashed police terror and at the same time sacked another 3500 workers. Many activists have gone underground.
The wages of garment workers in Bangladesh are the lowest in the world. The wages are only 20% of what is considered the country’s living wage. With such low wages, workers are crowded in horrific slums where as many as 30 workers share the same room in a makeshift arrangement. A minor illness kills a worker, as healthcare is non-existent.
From Bangladesh to Los Angeles and the faraway garment factories in El Salvador, the workers need communism where there is no wage slavery.
As long as capitalism exists, the bosses steal our surplus labor. In their effort to convert it into profit, they attack both the workers and other competing capitalists. This contradiction leads to the crisis of overproduction where too many goods are produced and the workers are discarded in the millions. The deepening of this crisis results in the looming imperialist war for profit.
The International Communist Workers’ Party (ICWP) is organizing workers all around the world to join us in our common goal to overthrow capitalism with communism. In communism, there will be no wages so nobody will steal our labor. Communism will also free up hundreds of millions of workers who are organized to support capitalism. The society will be organized to meet the needs of the working class and not capitalist bosses. The most hazardous tasks will be converted into joyful activity by the creativity of the workers.
To achieve our urgent tasks we are slowly but with firm determination translating ICWP’s main document Mobilize the Masses for Communism. The working class is angry and the workers truly feel that communism is the only solution.
The bosses have every reason to be scared. Every blow from the ruthless cops is producing thousands of resilient workers ready to be leaders for communist revolution. The garment industry in Bangladesh is dominated by women. They have shown that they can be fearless in the face of police terror. We will and we can win them to ICWP.
