Three port workers were suspended for obeying the General Workers' Union's "go slow" directive at the Freeport in a dispute over union recognition, the union said yesterday.
It said their suspension was another threat to trade unionism after the company froze €1 million of its assets through a court order the Freeport obtained when industrial action was ordered last week.
The GWU called such action illegal and said that, following the court order, the Freeport management was now turning on its workers. One of the suspended workers happened to be the GWU's shop steward.
The union also said it asked the Police Commissioner to investigate the Freeport's managing director, Uwe Malezki, and director John Portelli for "lying under oath" in connection with evidence they gave in court last week. The two claimed that the Freeport had already suffered €1 million in damages as a result of the industrial action ordered by the GWU - an exaggerated claim, according to the union.
Attempts to obtain the reaction of the Freeport management proved futile.
Meanwhile, the Labour Party appealed for the dispute to be resolved as soon as possible in the interests of the workers and trade unionism.
The party's employment relations spokesman Anġlu Farrugia called on the Freeport to take the lead as a gesture of goodwill, which would safeguard trade union rights and the rights of the workers.
Yesterday, the GWU also said a number of foreign trade unions vowed to help the union and were ready to arrange a form of international boycott by keeping cargo ships in other countries.
The saga has now been going on for weeks, with the GWU and the Malta Dockers' Union (MDU) fighting to be recognised as the official representatives of the workers, after both unions claimed to have the majority of the workers as members.
The GWU held a secret ballot which found it had the majority but the MDU insisted that its membership records proved otherwise. The Director of Employment and Industrial Relations stepped in and held one-on-one interviews with all the workers to see which of the unions they supported and officially recognised the MDU as the union representing the majority of workers.
But the GWU called the interview system "undemocratic" and said it had always been against such processes because they put workers at the mercy of retaliation. It therefore called on its workers to "go slow" but was held responsible for damages by the Freeport, which applied for a €1 million garnishee order that was granted by the courts.
On Monday, the union appealed the court order and requested that the Freeport be ordered to deposit €8 million as a guarantee for damages it was suffering as a result of the freeze on its assets.