Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2009, published 99th ILC session (2010)

Night Work (Women) Convention (Revised), 1948 (No. 89) - Burundi (Ratification: 1963)

The Committee notes with regret that the Government’s report has not been received. It hopes that a report will be supplied for examination by the Committee at its next session and that it will contain full information on the matters raised in its previous direct request, which read as follows:

Article 3 of the Convention. Prohibition of night work of women. The Committee notes the Government’s statement that it is in the process of denouncing Convention No. 89 to be replaced by the Night Work Convention, 1990 (No. 171), once ratified. In this respect, the Committee recalls that Convention No. 89 may be denounced every ten years and will again be open to denunciation for a period of one year as from 27 February 2011.

In addition, the Committee notes that the Government remains bound by the provisions of the Night Work (Women) Convention, 1919 (No. 4), and therefore action needs also to be taken in this regard. In its General Survey of 2001 on night work of women in industry, the Committee concluded that Convention No. 4 was a rigid instrument, ill-suited to present-day realities and manifestly of historical importance only (paragraph 193). Similarly, the ILO Governing Body, based on the recommendations of the Working Party on Policy regarding the Revision of Standards, decided to retain Convention No. 4 as a candidate for possible abrogation considering that it no longer corresponded to current needs and had become obsolete (see GB.283/LILS/WP/PRS/1/2, paragraphs 31–32 and 38). The Committee takes this opportunity to recall that, contrary to most other Conventions which may be denounced after an initial period of five or ten years but only during an interval of one year, the denunciation of Convention No. 4 is possible at any time provided that the representative organizations of employers and workers are fully consulted in advance. In fact, Article 13 of Convention No. 4 does not prescribe, as does Article 15(2) of Convention No. 89, for instance, that the right of denunciation may only be exercised within the 12-month period following the expiration of each period of ten years.

In light of the preceding observations, therefore, the Committee requests the Government to take appropriate action in respect of obsolete Convention No. 4. It also asks the Government to keep the Office informed of any further developments concerning the possible ratification of Convention No. 171 which shifts the emphasis from a specific category of workers and sector of economic activity to the safety and health protection of night workers irrespective of gender in nearly all branches and occupations.