reports from Germany A miner expressed the general mood on the demonstration in Bonn when he said "we've stayed quiet too long".
ane willingness to resist is Krow ing against a background of falling real wares, the dismanuing or the welfare state and rising unemploy. ment (4.7 million). 400,000 demonstrated in Bonn on the 15th June 1996. In October a hundred thousand struck successfully when it was proposed to reduce sick pay to 80% of wages. Now there is resistance from individual sectors, initially Coal mining receives 10,000 mil. lion marks of state subsidy a year. In the 'free market' very little runs without subsidy. In Germany this amounts to 185,000 million marks. This money is now supposed to be drastically TCOUCCU At the begin ning of February 200,000 people demonstrated against this in the Ruhr region.
When nans became known on March 7 that 66,000 out of 90,000 hituminous coal miners would lose their jobs in the next few years, an undeclared general strike spontancously broke out in the two mining regions, the Ruhr and the Saar. All pits were occupied and closed. Miners blocked roads and motorways and demonstrated through the They knew that if they continued to protest peacefully, they would be without a job. So they drove to Bonn. On the March 10 20,000 demonstrated, blocking the streets and the party offices of the Free Democrats (FDP, junior partlet in the coalition government and rabid "free marketeers') and breaking through the cordon around parliament.
In cach case the police bided their time (in Germany the individthe responsible state, North Rhine Westphalia, is a social democratgreen coalition government).
Chancellor Kobl refused to negotiate 'under pressure from the streets'. With difficulty the trade number of jobs will fall by 48,000, but nobody will be sacked. The miners accepted this because no. body will be fired.
The building workers' situation is, more difficult. Over one and a half million work in this sector, Be cause 400,000 foreigners work on lower rates, unemployment is high under pressure.
in addition, this winter 'bad weather pay' (if work is not possible because of bad weather, particularly in winter, building workers still get paid) was scrapped, and workers were made unemploved instead. The employers had agreed that the wage rates for cast German building workers would be raised to the west Gorleben has no railway connection, and at the point where the waste was transterred to neary lor ries 7,000 people occupied the road for a whole night in temperatures of minus 5C. The next morning the road was cleared after a struggle one see hours witne ployment of water cannon and Thousands tried to nothing, but do what you must"
An activist declared "We are many, we are angry, and we can do things which the union won't." Action was organised over mobile phones wich couldn't be over. heard.
Streets were blocked in Berlin too. The massive building site on Potsdam Square was occupied. The unthinkable happened: there were calculated acts of sabotage causing considerable damage.
A ountains trench fan with water because the safety mechanism suddenly failed, and expensive machinery broke down. Militant resistance was carried out for the first time in a long time.
They were only able to delay the transport for a time: The police went in brutally. 665 charged so far. However, the resistance has not been broken, it became an example for others: a building workers also ignored the rules of legal action.