Ten Samanoud Textiles workers arrested over strike to demand minimum wage

Ten workers from the Nahdet Samanoud Textiles Company, which manufactures jeans for export from its site in Gharbiya, were arrested by security forces on Sunday after striking to demand minimum wage, according to the Center for Trade Union and Workers Services (CTUWS), a labor advocacy and research group.

CTUWS General Coordinator Kamal Abbas told Mada Masr that all ten of the workers were still in custody at the Samanoud Police Station at the time of writing.

Workers went on strike for a week to demand that the factory implement the new LE6,000 minimum wage announced by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi earlier this year, a demand mirrored in a number of strikes held by workers around the country whose wages remain unaffected by the increase. 

Following the president’s approval of the new minimum wage for civil servants in February and a Public Enterprise Ministry decision to roll out the same wage standards for workers in its affiliated companies, workers at the Samanoud Textiles factory demanded repeatedly that management implement the minimum wage, according to a CTUWS statement released on Sunday afternoon.

Companies owned by the Public Enterprise Ministry in the state’s industrial sector were granted the same wage increase after weeks of strike action at the Mahalla spinning and weaving factory in February.

The minimum wage increase came shortly before the central bank devalued the Egyptian pound by around 60 percent against the dollar, causing the cost of living to soar for households in Egypt’s import-dependent economy.

Management at Samanoud ignored the workers' demands, leading them to begin a strike on August 18, showing up on time for their work shifts before returning home, said Abbas. The strike escalated on Saturday as workers held a sit-in inside the company.

In the early hours of Sunday morning, security forces arrested ten of the company's workers, including four women. All of those arrested were questioned at the National Security Agency headquarters in Mahalla al-Kubra, Gharbiya, CTUWS added.

Samanoud has a years-long history of ignoring worker demands for increases to low wages, said Abbas, and has also used punitive measures to pressure workers into early retirement. The company is likely being considered for liquidation, he added, as the state looks to downsize its role in industry. Part of the company’s land was offered for sale in an auction in 2020.

The past decade of the company’s history has witnessed frequent strikes over wages, to demand an end to layoffs, and to protest mismanagement that led to the company’s closure in 2014 and 2019.

Abbas said that the workers had received promises in 2014 from then-Industry Minister Mounir Fakhry of plans to develop the company, but no steps were taken in that direction.