Last week, Incheon International Airport was granted the ‘Airport of the Year Award’ by the CAPA Center for Aviation. A few weeks before that, it received an award from the UN Global Compact Korea Council for “management respectful of labor rights.” Incheon Airport, moreover, has been ranked no. 1 in Airport Service Quality by the Airport Council International (ACI) for 8 years in a row.

The Incheon International Airport Corporation (hereafter ‘Airport Corporation’) boasts about these awards in the media and on signs posted throughout the airport. This glittering image, however, only thinly masks a dark reality: Some 6,000 subcontracted workers work long, backbreaking hours to keep the airport sparkling clean and running smoothly. Their low wages translate into the the profits the Airport Corporation records.

Yet, the Airport Corporation has continues to turn its back on us. Worse, now that we have formed a union and are demanding their rights, it is threatening us with criminal charges and dismissals.

 Treats workers well?

The airport corporation says it treats workers well. It even got the UN Global Compact Korea Council, a group of companies including the Airport Corporation who have voluntarily agree to promote corporation social responsibility (so, not so trustworthy), to give it an award for respecting labor rights.

When compared with the facts, however, this claim falls to pieces. For example, the hourly wage of janitors at the airport is lower than that of janitors working on college campuses. Should the hourly wage of special security guards at the airport stay the same next year it would be in violation of the minimum wage law. In other areas like labor intensity and benefits, as well, the Airport Corporation is number 1 not in ‘respect for labor rights’, but in labor exploitation.

 What about job security?

Subcontracts conclude service contracts with the Airport Corporation for 3, at most 5 years. Every time a service contract ends and a new subcontractor comes in, we face the possibility of losing our jobs.

The airport corporation says that 98% of workers keep their jobs even when the subcontractor that employs them changes. The problem is that all subcontracted workers spend their lives working at the airport fearing we will become the 2% that don’t. If our wages are cut or conditions worsen when a new subcontractor comes in, we are afraid to protest, for fear of being laid off. Even now, if you go to Entrance 8 to the Passenger Terminal you will find two maintenance workers who were laid off picketing for reinstatement.

 Wages cut by 160,000 won

The subcontractor employing airport shuttle bus drivers changed on December 1. The new contractor coming in did less favorably in the tendering process. The result, the drivers’ monthly wages are to be cut by 160,000 won (roughly USD 150). The drivers were notified about the cut on November 26. The airport corporation says there’s nothing it can do, adding utter disrespect to utter exploitation.

These workers have had enough. Together with other subcontracted workers, they will again walk off the job in the days to come.

 Our Struggle for Respect

We have fought now for several years to change the situation at Incheon Airport. We formed a union – the KPTU Incheon Airport Regional Branch – in 2008, began bargaining with subcontractors and calling on the Airport Corporation to come to the table. Finally, in November of this year, we walking off the job for the first time. Through escalating strike tactics in the first part of November, we forced the Airport Corporation to call a meeting together with union and subcontracting company representatives on November 14.

Following the meeting we were able to teach agreements with subcontractors on almost on all demands. The Airport Corporation agreed, moreover, to come up with a proposal on the main demands that require its intervention, such as issues of wages, seniority allowances, job security and a table for discussing conversation to direct employment.

We thus agreed to wait for the Airport Corporation’s proposal. It has been two weeks, however, and we have received nothing substantial. Instead, it has persisted with charges and threats of dismissal against union officers and members.

We have waited to be treated like human beings for 13 years, since the opening of Incheon Airport and now for two more weeks. Enough is enough. Our patience is worn out and we are preparing to walk out.

We are sure that looking back the Airport Corporation will remember December 2013 as a nightmare while subcontracted workers will remember it as the moment at which we claimed our dignity.