Late last week, DISK, KESK, TMMOB and TTB held a joint press conference to state that May 1st will be Labor and Workers Unity and Solidarity and Struggle Day and to ensure that they would all celebrate this day with the enthusiasm shown for the Newroz celebrations in Kurdistan and Turkey.

In Amed preparation are underway to ensure a great May Day rally. ANF spoke to Mehmet Şirin Gürbüz, Amed Regional Representative of the Confederation of Revolutionary Workers' Unions (DİSK) about the work they are carrying out.

Gürbüz stated that they are meeting with all political parties and institutions, except the MHP and the AKP, to ensure their participation in the May Day rally, and said they received positive answers from these talks.

Gürbüz, who said that they plan to use a variety of materials, said: "We have prepared reports, brochures, posters and banners.We are carrying out a door to door work, actually landing on all the streets and corners of the city in order to ensure that Amed celebrates May Day”.

Underlining that given the recent decision by the AKP-MHP alliance to “call for such “an election under repression”, Gürbüz said that “it is all the more important to celebrate May Day with a magnificent and enthusiastic air. We should show solidarity and cry out for thousands of workers, working people and our fellow union members and executives who are under investigation for security reasons or others”.

Gürbüz emphasized that they are planning to celebrate a regional May Day calling on people from both Amed and the surrounding districts: "We welcome the participation to the regional celebration and we are inviting all the oppressed and other people to join our rally”.

Gürbüz added that there are a number of slogans for this year rally: "There are slogans advocating peace, defending peace, asking for a democratic and peaceful resolution of the Kurdish question. Others are slogans calling to fight for a free life in equality and in one’s own identity and language as well as in a peaceful and democratic environment: We invite all people from Amed who will join the May Day rally to stand against the attacks on employment rights under the pretext of 'work security' and 'security investigations’. We will say 'stop’: stop hunger, poverty and exploitation of democratic law. Stop to custody, arrest, injustice”.

DİSK Amed Regional Representative Mehmet Şirin Gürbüz, ended by reiterating that unions want to make May Day a day of struggle and solidarity among workers: “Amed may not be an industrial or textile city, but it is a city of workers. - he said - We think that May Day is meaningful and important for our people. It is important to say “stop” to the State of Emergency and special legislations. They won’t succeed in bending the friends of Kawa the ironsmith. Let’s fill Station Square on 1 May”.