Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2015, published 105th ILC session (2016)

Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1949 (No. 98) - Mauritania (Ratification: 2001)

The Committee notes the observations of the International Trade Confederation (ITUC), received on 1 September 2015, reporting recurrent threats and intimidation against trade unionists in the mining and ports sectors. The Committee urges the Government to send its comments on this matter. The Committee also notes the observations received on 28 August 2015 from the General Confederation of Workers of Mauritania (CGTM), and the Government’s reply thereto.

Articles 4 and 6 of the Convention. The Committee notes that the Government’s report contains no reply to its previous comments on the need to amend certain provisions of the Labour Code in order to align them with the Convention. The Committee trusts that in the current process to revise the Code, due account will be taken of the points recalled below:

• -Right to collective bargaining. Recalling that compulsory arbitration imposed on the two parties by the authorities leading to a binding award is difficult to reconcile with the principle of free and voluntary negotiation, the Committee requests the Government to amend sections 350–356 of the Labour Code so as to limit recourse to compulsory arbitration, in the event of a collective dispute, to public servants engaged in the administration of the State (Article 6 of the Convention), to essential services in the strict sense, namely services the interruption of which would endanger the life, personal safety or health of the whole or part of the population, and to situations of acute national crisis.
• -Collective bargaining in the public sector. In its previous comments, the Committee referred to section 68 of the Labour Code, which states that, where the personnel of public services enterprises and establishments is not governed by specific conditions of service set out in a law or regulations, collective agreements may be concluded in accordance with the provisions applying to “simple collective agreements”. According to the Code, the list of establishments concerned shall be determined by decree. The Government indicates in its report that the decree in question will be adopted as part of the revision of the general collective labour agreement of 1974. The Committee trusts that the Government will in the near future report the adoption of the decree establishing the list of public establishments affected by section 68 of the Labour Code, to ensure that, in accordance with the Convention, the right to collective bargaining is effectively recognized for all public servants and employees not engaged in the administration of the State, including those that have no specific conditions of service.