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.
May Day in Frankfurt, Germany: WISAG worker warns of tens of thousands of job cuts
This year, the DGB (German Trade Union Confederation) held its ritual May Day rally under the meaningless motto “Solidarity is the Future.” On the fringes of the official rally in front of Frankfurt’s Alte Oper, a group of workers spoke out. Speaking on behalf of the dismissed WISAG workers, Ertugrul Kurnaz said: “That sounds good, but it can only be true if solidarity is not just something for the future, and if you stop just talking about it.”
Kurnaz started by reporting about the struggle at the Rhine-Main airport against mass dismissals. Rally participants and passers-by stopped and listened with interest. Kurnaz said he could sum up what the WISAG company was doing to the workers at the airport “in four simple words: they were used, exploited, tricked and thrown out.” The only unusual thing, he said, was that they did not just quietly accept it. “We did not bow down. We started f