| National organization(s) | SLLC |
|---|---|
| Regulatory authority | Ministry of Labour and Social Security |
| Primary legislation | Employment Act 2023 |
| Total union membership | 354,747 (2022) |
| Trade union density | 13% (2022) |
| Global Rights Index | |
| 4 Systematic violations of rights | |
| International Labour Organization | |
| Sierra Leone is a member of the ILO | |
| Convention ratification | |
| Freedom of Association | 15 June 1961 |
| Right to Organise | 13 June 1961 |
Trade unions in Sierra Leone first emerged in the period around World War I, with reports indicating that civil servants organised unions as early as 1912. The Railway Workers Union was founded in 1919. In the late 1930s, trade unions affiliated to the Youth League formed the Trade Union Congress (TUC) to coordinate actions within the labour movement. In 1940, trade unions were legalised. In 1946 tripartite bargaining councils were established that incorporated trade unions for minimum wage and sectoral bargaining with employers. The Sierra Leone Labour Congress (SLLC) was founded in 1976. Although the country's civil war at the end of the 20th Century had a devastating effect on the labour movement, unions played an important role in nonviolent resistance, launching a national strike in the immediate aftermath of the 1997 coup by the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council. Since the end of the civil war, trade unionism in the informal sector has grown.
Existing unions
| Members | CBAs | CBA
coverage | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Artisans Public Works of Services Employees Union | 2,600 | 6 | 12,000 |
| Clerical Banking Insurance Accounting Petroleum Union | 3,010 | 7 | 15,000 |
| Construction Workers Union | 2,500 | 1 | 8,000 |
| Electricity Employees Union | 2,200 | 1 | 20,000 |
| Hotel Food Drinks Tobacco Entertainment Workers Unions | 580 | 2 | 14,000 |
| Union of Mass Media, Financial Institutions, Chemical Industries & General Workers | 1,500 | 2 | 13,000 |
| Maritime & Waterfront Workers Union | 1,500 | 2 | 13,000 |
| Municipal & General Government Employees Union | 1,000 | 2 | 3,000 |
| National Union of Civil Servants | 1,500 | 1 | 8,000 |
| National Union of Forestry & Agricultural Workers | 1,500 | 3 | 8,000 |
| Sierra Leone Fishermen's Union | 1,600 | 1 | 3,000 |
| Sierra Leone Dockworkers Union | 1,500 | 1 | 4,000 |
| Sierra Leone Health Services Union | 4,000 | 1 | 16,000 |
| Sierra Leone National Seamen's Union | 1,550 | 1 | 1,500 |
| Sierra Leone Teachers’ Union | 36,000 | 1 | 40,000 |
| Sierra Leone Union of Postal & Telecommuncations Employees Union | 1,054 | 1 | 2,500 |
| Sierra Leone Reporter Union | 450 | – | – |
| Sierra Leone Union of Security, Watchmen & General Workers | 3,200 | 2 | 5,000 |
| Skilled & Manual Productive Workers Union | 810 | 4 | 1,300 |
| United Mine Workers Union | 1,602 | 1 | 6,000 |
| Union of Railway Plantation, Minerals, Industry & Construction | 300 | 1 | 1,000 |
| Sierra Leone Port Authority Senior Staff Association | 82 | – | – |
| Members | CBAs | CBA
coverage | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Indigenous Petty Traders Association | 55,000 | – | – |
| Indigenous Photographers’ Union | 1,000 | – | – |
| Sierra Leone Artisanal Fishermen's Union | 17,106 | – | – |
| Sierra Leone Traders Union | 105,000 | – | – |
| Sierra Leone Musicians Union | 500 | – | – |
| Sierra Leone Bike Riders Union | 120,000 | – | – |
| Motor Drivers & General Transport Workers Union | 50,000 | 1 | 1,000 |
| Union of Timber Factory Owners & Workers | 1,237 | – | – |
| Sierra Leone Commercial Tricycle Riders Union | 700 | – | – |
| Sierra Leone Technicians Union | 700 | – | – |
| Home and General Workers Union | 1,500 | – | – |
| Omolankay Whellbarrow & Porters Union | 1,000 | – | – |
References
Footnotes
- ^ DTDA 2023, p. 7.
- Orr 1966, p. 66.
- Amolo 1979, p. 37.
- Conway 1968, p. 61.
- Hotchkiss 1979, p. 439.
- Luke 1985a, p. 439.
- Stirling 2013, p. 536.
- Press 2015, pp. 105–148.
- McDermott 2023.
- ^ DTDA 2023, p. 30.
Sources
- Abdullah, Ibrahim (1994). "Rethinking the Freetown Crowd: The Moral Economy of the 1919 Strikes and Riot in Sierra Leone". Canadian Journal of African Studies / Revue Canadienne des Études Africaines. 28 (2): 197. doi:10.2307/485715.
- Abdullah, Ibrahim (August 1995). ""Liberty or Death": Working Class Agitation and the Labour Question in Colonial Freetown, 1938–1939". International Review of Social History. 40 (2): 195–221. doi:10.1017/S0020859000113203.
- Abdullah, Ibrahim (1997). "The Colonial State and Wage Labor in Postwar Sierra Leone, 1945–1960: Attempts at Remaking the Working Class". International Labor and Working-Class History. 52: 87–105. doi:10.1017/S0147547900006955.
- Amman, John; O’Donnell, James (2011). "The Sierra Leone Teachers Union: Labor in a Post-Conflict Society". WorkingUSA. 14 (1): 57–71. doi:10.1111/j.1743-4580.2011.00320.x. ISSN 1089-7011.
- Amolo, Milcah (1979). "Trade Unionism and Colonial Authority Sierra Leone: 1930—1945". Transafrican Journal of History. 8 (1/2): 36–52. ISSN 0251-0391.
- Conway, H. E. (1968). "Labour Protest Activity in Sierra Leone during the Early Part of the Twentieth Century". Labour History (15): 49. doi:10.2307/27507909.
- Denzer, LaRay (June 1982). "Wallace-Johnson and the Sierra Leone Labor Crisis of 1939". African Studies Review. 25 (2/3): 159. doi:10.2307/524215.
- Hotchkiss, W. E. (1979). "Sources and Characteristics of Union Leadership: A Note on Sierra Leone". Indian Journal of Industrial Relations. 14 (3): 437–447. ISSN 0019-5286.
- "Labour Market Profile Sierra Leone – 2023/2024" (PDF). ulandssekretariatet.dk. Danish Trade Union Development Agency. April 2023. pp. 1–36. Retrieved 8 November 2023.
- Luke, David Fashole (1985a). "The Development of Modern Trade Unionism in Sierra Leone, Part I". The International Journal of African Historical Studies. 18 (3): 425. doi:10.2307/218647.
- Luke, David Fashole (1985b). "The Development of Modern Trade Unionism in Sierra Leone, Part II". The International Journal of African Historical Studies. 18 (4): 625. doi:10.2307/218800.
- McDermott, Joshua Lew (June 2023). "Searching for the Informal Labor Movement: Theorizing Class and Collective Action among Informal Workers in West Africa". Review of Radical Political Economics. 55 (2): 333–352. doi:10.1177/04866134221134548.
- McQuinn, Mark (2017). "Strengths and Weaknesses of African Trade Unions in the Neoliberal Period with a Sierra Leone Case Study". Africana Studia. 28: 111–129.
- Orr, Charles A. (1966). "Trade Unionism in Colonial Africa". The Journal of Modern African Studies. 4 (1): 65–81. ISSN 0022-278X.
- Press, Robert M. (2015). "Mass Noncooperation Helps Defeat a Violent Junta". Ripples of Hope. Amsterdam University Press. ISBN 978-90-8964-748-1.
- Stirling, John (May 2011). "Trade unions in a fragile state: the case of Sierra Leone: Trade unions in Sierra Leone". Industrial Relations Journal. 42 (3): 236–253. doi:10.1111/j.1468-2338.2011.00621.x.
- Stirling, John (19 December 2013). "Power in practice: Trade union education in Sierra Leone". McGill Journal of Education / Revue des sciences de l'éducation de McGill. 48 (3): 531–550. ISSN 1916-0666.
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