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A
meatpacking company Wednesday laid off about 100 Muslim immigrant
workers who walked off the job last week in protest of the firm's
refusal to give them time to pray during the holy month of Ramadan.
When Ramadan began Sept. 1, workers said supervisors informally gave them time to break their daylong fast at sundown.
But non-Muslim employees protested, and on
Friday, JBS Swift & Co. officials refused to give workers break
time to pray and eat.
About 400 workers left the company's
meatpacking plant, which dominates this city of 90,000. By Tuesday, 250
had not returned, and Swift warned that those who didn't come back
faced immediate termination.
"This action is a direct violation
of our collective bargaining agreement," Swift said in a statement
released Wednesday afternoon.
Greeley police were called as angry workers who had arrived for the 3:15 p.m. shift were given their layoff notices.
The
United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 7, which represents
workers at the meatpacking plant, said it would fight the firings.
"The
workers weren't given enough notice to get back to their jobs," said
union spokesman Manny Gonzales. "We don't feel this was a terminable
offense to begin with."
The Muslim workers, mainly Somali
immigrants, have recently flocked to the plant, replacing many of the
262 workers, mostly Latinos, who were detained as illegal immigrants
following a federal raid in late 2006. Many of the Muslim employees who
walked off their jobs last week had been in Greeley only a few months.
One
of them, 35-year-old Iman Ibrahim, left Boston for Greeley this summer
because a friend told him about jobs at the meatpacking plant.
Ibrahim
said Swift supervisors had shut off water fountains Friday evening to
prevent Muslim workers from having their traditional drink to break the
fast, and in one case a supervisor grabbed an employee by the neck,
yanking him from his prayers.
"If I'd known there was a problem with prayer, I would have never come here," Ibrahim said.
Nonetheless,
he had returned to work by Wednesday and said supervisors were
informally giving time for the requisite sundown prayer. "I like
working," he said. "We like to live in this country. We didn't come to
cause trouble."
Some other Swift workers, however, were angered
by the Muslims' requests for extra prayer time. "Somalis are running
our plant," worker Brianna Castillo told the Greeley Tribune. "They are
telling us what to do."
Non-Muslim workers complained they had
to do additional work when Muslims went to pray, which devout followers
do five times a day.
Aziz Dhies, a local nurse who represented
Somali workers in negotiations with Swift, said he believed workers of
all creeds should share in the breaks.
He added that Muslims had
no choice in the matter. "This is not something we're making up
ourselves," Dhies said. "This is something written in [holy] books that
we have to do."
In its statement, Swift officials said the
company was "grateful to employ a multicultural workforce and works
closely with all employees and their union representation to
accommodate religious practices in a reasonable, safe and fair manner
to all involved."
Union officials argue that the contract allows for the extra break time.
"Many companies pay time and a half for working Christian holidays," Gonzales said.
"It's a different time now, and we should respect different people's values."
Source: Los Angeles Times
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