ASKER, 19 October 2006 — Work in Bahrain’s aluminum smelter Alba came to halt for an hour yesterday morning in the first worker walkout in decades in the country to press demands for a wage increase.

More than 1,000 union workers from Bahrain Aluminum Company took part in the protest that was held inside the company and caused work stoppage in all non-essential facilities at it.

The workers were protesting a unilateral decision by the company to give them a 15 to 22 percent wage increase, below the 30 percent pay hike the union was demanding for its members in three months of negotiations.

The strike was the first of its kind to be organized by a Bahraini workers union in decades, coming two days after King Hamad issued a decree amending the existing labor law in the private sector to ban the dismissal of a worker because of his union activities.

The decree also instructed courts to reinstate the employee to his post and order the employer to compensate him for the period spent out of work when proven that his dismissal was based on his union activities.

The union, with some 2,400 members, is the largest in Bahrain. “The strike is not an attempt to harm the company or the national economy, but the management needs to understand that the workers’ interests must be taken into consideration,” Alba’s union head Ali Abdullah Al-Binali told Arab News. “The strike which will continue until our demands are met is a real test of the new law and the company’s will to adhere to it,” he said.

Work was stopped in all non-essential parts of the company, but workers in key areas like the turbines unit that provide electricity to the facility and country’s electricity grid stayed on the job. During the strike, the workers carried Bahraini flags and posters of the king, whom they praised for passing the law and standing up for them.

Alba, which commissioned its $1.7 billion Line 5 expansion project in May 2005, increasing its aluminum production capacity to 840,000 metric tons, from 530, 000 metric tons, is the world’s largest modern smelter and the third largest aluminum factory.

Half of Alba’s production is sold in the Bahrain market, another 20 percent is exported to the Far East, 18 percent to the Gulf, and 7 percent to Southeast Asia.

Bahrain was the second Gulf state to legalize labor unions in 2002 after Kuwait.