2016 International Labor Day Statement

Fight for our rights, our families, our future: Migrant and local workers unite for a world without imperialist globalization!

1 May 2016A world without imperialism is possible.

This is the statement of the International Migrants Alliance as we join the movements of workers and peoples around the world in commemorating International Labour Day this 2016.

Everywhere, imperialism causes suffering to workers and peoples. Through the years, it has imposed the neoliberal policies of liberalisation, deregulation and privatisation that have spelled doom on many economies, devastating our agriculture and industry, and causing long-stricken poverty and social unrest.

Continually unrepentant of the global economic depression that it has caused, imperialism is crafting new schemes to salvage itself, which can only mean more destruction of our environment and much more intensified exploitation of peoples and nations.

The TransPacific Partnership is one of these. Already receiving flak and resistance from workers all over the world, capitalist governments are railroading the TPP not to create jobs but open up economies and even violate national sovereignty in the name of monopolised trade and maximum profit.

The Global Forum on Migration and Development contributes to this continued imperialist onslaught by facilitating migration for development. Since its inception in 2007, the GFMD has never seriously taken up and addressed the plight of migrant workers but instead focused its energies on effectively making remittance as a tool for development. Clearly, this platform only aims to perpetuate the phenomenon of global labor migration for the sake of profit.

Right now, many of us suffer. Protection of rights of workers has never been ensured while labor export intensifies. Discrimination, racism and pitting local against migrant workers are happening everywhere. Wages continue to be depressed while the limited space for democratic rights and freedoms is being curbed. The world has seen the migrant workers' suffering through the eyes of Erwian Sulistyaningsih and Mary Jane Veloso. There are many countless migrant workers suffering yet no significant mechanisms have been made to fortify protection for them.

As we speak, the European refugee crisis rages on. With imperialist-instigated proxy wars destroying their homes and their countries in the Middle East, our Arab brothers and sisters have nowhere else to go but the nearest countries in Europe to beg for shelter, food and livelihood. The international community had to pressure these capitalist governments to welcome the refugees whose countries many of them have helped destroy.

Migrant and local workers bear the brunt of the crisis that imperialism has created and will continue to suffer as long as imperialism exists. Abject poverty, massive unemployment, corporate takeover of our lands and industry, the rape of our environment, economy and nations, wars of aggression and occupation - these are the root causes of forced migration that we have to collectively confront and address. Let our voices be heard - Down with imperialist exploitation, plunder and war!

For our rights, our families and the future of our world, migrant and local workers need to come together and collectively resist imperialism and its cohorts. It is only through our unity, solidarity and militant struggle can we be stronger as a global labor movement and fight imperialist exploitation. We need to remain critical and focused, conducting discussions and studying our society, launching campaigns that will advance our rights and peoples' interests, and ensuring that any neoliberal policy or scheme fails.

Long live international solidarity!