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New layoffs at Frankfurt airport
Among workers hit by mass layoffs in Germany’s air transport industry, employees of WISAG were among the first to react. At Frankfurt Airport, dozens went on hunger strike in February. They have protested there every week since against their illegitimate dismissal.
WISAG workers protest in front of the villa of the group’s CEO Michael Wisser, March 27, 2021 (Photo: WSWS)
Just recently, another WISAG operation at Frankfurt Airport announced mass redundancies. Aviation Service GmbH (ASG), which belongs to the Wisser Group, laid off 87 of the 610 workers still employed there. Before the pandemic, there were almost 800 staff, but all temporary employees and agency workers had already been dismissed. ASG is responsible for aircraft interior cleaning and transport services. As with the WISAG workers, numerous long-serving, experienced workers, as well as 12 severely disabled people, are being fired for cost-savings.
Workers and youth in Germany support call for International Workers Alliance and mobilise for ICFI May Day online rally
Workers and youth from across Germany tell the WSWS why they support the International Committee of the Fourth International’s call for the formation of the International Workers Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees and will be attending tomorrow’s May Day rally of the ICFI. We call on our readers to register here for this important event.
Habip
Habip Bektas is one of the WISAG workers at Rhein-Main Airport in Frankfurt who have been fighting their dismissals for almost half a year. In December, the experienced airport worker received his dismissal along with a total of around 230 other colleagues, some of whom had spent almost 40 years at the airport, ruining their health while handling the planes.
WISAG imposes new sackings at Frankfurt Airport
For three months, a group of ground workers at Frankfurt Airport has been fighting against their dismissal by service provider WISAG. With eight demonstrations and rallies so far and an eight-day hunger strike, these workers turned to their colleagues under the slogan, “Today it’s us tomorrow you!” and made their struggle known to the public.
The response of the WISAG group, which handles planes at Frankfurt’s Rhein-Main Airport, is even more brutal sackings. At the beginning of March, over 30 more long-serving employees, including some who are severely disabled, were given notice to quit at the end of June 2021. This became known on March 11, when workers gathered for another demonstration in front of the WISAG group headquarters in Frankfurt.
WISAG ground workers at Frankfurt Airport call for expanded struggle
The WISAG ground workers maintained their hunger strike at Terminal 1 of Rhein-Main Airport for eight days before they had to break it off on the evening of March 3. Before that several hunger strikers had collapsed since Sunday. The workers have temporarily suspended their action, “exclusively for health reasons,” as they say.
The ground workers are fighting against 230 dismissals, increasing exploitation and low wages. They have not capitulated, but on the contrary want to expand the struggle. In a courageous appeal published today by the
World Socialist Web Site, they say: “Workers everywhere are facing very similar problems. We must fight together! (.) We, the workers, are ‘essential’, without us society does not function. We say: Life before profits! The health and well-being of the workers are more important than the profits of the financial oligarchy.”