The YCW is a movement of education through action based on the experiences young workers live. The starting point of YCW is personal and collective situations that the young workers live in everyday life and the values that are contradictory to their beliefs and aspirations that exist in the society.
A solidarity dinner with the International YCW was held in Brussels, Belgium, on 25 February 2011.
The aims of the event were:
Consolidating the relations with organizations and leaders of organizations in Belgium;
Giving visibility to our campaign for the right to social protection (right to decent work, to quality education and to a society where gender equality prevails);
Ensuring stronger support for the actions carried out by young workers, members of the IYCW;
Raising funds and strengthening our self-financing capacity.
The objectives we had set were attained. Several organizations and many friends came to share the joy of getting together with friends and activists from different periods around a table for a good meal. We had time to dance, talk and get to know some experiences of action carried out by young workers.
Over 100 people were present at the activity. Those who came included members of organizations that have close relations and carry out joint actions with the IYCW, including Entraide et Fraternité and Solidarité Mondiale (WSM), members of other social organizations working with immigrants, such as Destellos de Esperanza and Acción para el Desarrollo Internacional (ADI), or members of MIJARC. Activists and coordinators of the Flemish and the Walloon YCW movements were also there, and we were happy to have with us many former YCW members of different periods and many friends.
Through a video projection, we presented the action carried out by the Philippines YCW. They have been in contact with young people working as “pedicab” drivers since 2001. They launched a survey to discover the reality of those workers. As we can see from the testimony of one of those young workers:
“The Philippines YCW is in contact with us. It has organized several training sessions to help us understand our working conditions, labor laws, and the importance of organizing ourselves. We have made several analyses which enabled us to come up with the following demands:
Right of association;
Right to have a parking place;
Setting of prices;
Right to social security.
Those young people submitted their demands to the local authorities and some time later, after a long struggle and a good organization on their part, some of their demands were met.
Other projections showed actions and activities of the IYCW, the Walloon YCW and the Flemish YCW, so that the audience could know more about the struggles carried out by young workers to improve their living conditions and obtain social protection for all.
As we mentioned above, the purpose of this event included raising funds and strengthening our capacity to self-finance our actions. But most of all we wanted it to encourage all leaders of the movement, whether at local, national or continental level, to rally and contribute to the financial education of young workers through concrete actions and activities carried out by the young workers themselves.
We believe it is the most educational means we have to give the young people in initiation, the activists and the coordinators the feeling of being integrated and of belonging to an international movement. For they are the ones who build it, give it its orientations, and support it politically and financially.
As our autonomous characteristic requires: “The basic expenses of the movement are met by the personal support and fundraising activities of young workers so that the orientation and direction of the movement remain permanently in their hands.”
The International Secretariat would like to extend a warm thank you to the members of the IYCW management committee, the organization Acción para el Desarrollo Internacional (ADI), as well as to all those who assisted us directly and indirectly in organizing this solidarity dinner. We would never have been able to hold such a big event without their support and solidarity. Thanks a million!
We are continuing our action because young workers are the actors of change today, just like they were yesterday and will be tomorrow.
A solidarity dinner with the International YCW was held in Brussels, Belgium, on 25 February 2011.
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