International Labor Day at Three Kings Monument

May 1

International Labor Day 2025 at Three Kings Monument, organized by Northern Labor Network. The theme was “We (the workers) don’t fight alone.”

Press Release:

We organized Labor Day because we wanted to revive the consciousness of being a laborer for the people of Chiang Mai. Nowadays, many people in many professions do not think of themselves as laborers, even though they work for wages. When they do not think of themselves as laborers, they do not dare to demand the rights that laborers should receive.

Chiang Mai is a tourist city. Many Chiang Mai people have to face wage theft by employers, such as workers being forced to work for wages higher than the law stipulates, being forced to work overtime without receiving OT pay, having their wages deducted as punishment, having their social security payments deducted but not being remitted by the employer. These are the money that employers steal from workers. The wealth of employers comes from theft, but employers are never branded as thieves. However, the money that workers have to lose, no matter how much or how little, is a lot for workers. Chiang Mai itself is a big city, a tourist city, very diverse, with a variety of workers. We have found that each worker faces their own problems and has their own struggles. Doctors and nurses have to work inhumanely hard. Coffee shop workers throughout Chiang Mai do not receive wages that are below the minimum wage law. Construction workers do not have enough safety equipment, which is dangerous for their lives. Female workers are sexually abused by gray capital. Migrant workers have their documents seized by overbearing employers to prevent them from doing business. Company employees throughout the country have had their social security, which is like their last guarantee, stolen. Freelancers have been cheated by lousy employers who then sue to shut them up. We have heard all these stories before.

Even though workers are fighting, fighting alone does not last long and they lack bargaining power. This is the origin of the theme of the event, “We, the Workers, Are Not Fighting Alone,” which comes from the belief that workers being treated unfairly is not something that any one person should face alone. We want to create a sense of group formation in order to let all workers know that they are not fighting alone, that it is fair and ready to stand together. There are many others who are facing unfairness.

Every year we submit a petition to civil servants. The petitions are written by different organizations in our network that work with various labor groups. This year we see that labor should be more involved in politics because:
Politics is the biggest factor in determining the lives of the working class, so the Chiang Mai mayoral candidate was invited to receive policies from the working class at the event.

declaration

On the day the skyscrapers collapsed due to the earthquake, the lives of our friends became just dust and cement. You may see them as just numbers, as value, as profit. While our friends, the workers, have faces, as breath, as families and lovers. How much do their lives cost? We really want to know how much you value the lives of our friends?

Fellow workers from all nations, you are us and we are you. We are all of the same nationality, the nationality called the “working class!!”

Fellow workers, we all suffer the same hardships. No matter where you are, what you do for a living, or how you survive, we are all workers. We are all people who work for money, hoping that one day we will have a better life and be able to live happily with our loved ones.
But in reality, we have to work day and night, working long hours in a tourist city that people from all over the world visit. Our wages are very low. They give us a starting salary of 9,000 baht! There are still freelance workers who are insecure, being sued to silence them for criticizing the exploitation of their employers. Many workers still have to endure and work lousy jobs, including migrant workers who have no rights, no voice, and are oppressed in many ways, beyond what they can complain or shout out.

Everything that has happened has made us realize that our city is not a world-class tourist city, but a city of labor oppression. The enormous profits have never reached our hands. We can only wonder who has that wealth gone to?

On the contrary, the prices of rice, water and electricity are increasingly high. Debts are plaguing our lives. We have to survive amidst a global situation that is full of exploitation from international investors, war, killing and commercial competition among the rich and powerful billionaires. We have discovered the truth that this world is a world where we have no power to determine the destiny of our own lives.

In an uncertain world, the alarm clock rings every day, urging us to get out of bed, go to work, get cursed at by shitty bosses, get cursed at for scraps, do risky jobs until we can’t stand it anymore. So we start arguing with them. We ask for a pay raise, they pay us, we ask to work less. But when we start arguing with our bosses, making demands, they threaten to fire us, to sue us, to pressure us.
They try to scare us, to try to suppress the vast working class from standing up to the employers who treat us unfairly. We are made to believe that the problems we face are personal, personal burdens that we must shoulder and solve alone. This thinking makes us feel isolated, lost, powerless, and exhausted from standing up to the injustices being done to us.

This is the origin of the theme of the event, “We, the Workers, Are Not Alone in Fighting,” which comes from the belief that being treated unfairly by workers is not something that any one person should have to face alone. We want to create awareness in grouping together to let all workers know that they are not the only ones fighting. There are many others who are facing injustice and are ready to stand together.

Tomorrow, after International Labor Day ends

We must disperse and return to the working world.

A world of service to employers and the rich

A world of pressure, oppression and exploitation

A world where we will have to face fatigue for a very long time..

But this is not the end, but the beginning of the fight.

It is not enough for us to march on the streets once a year and then go home.

But we have to talk about the labor exploitation that we are facing every day.

We will invite the comrades we meet to walk alongside us on the front lines where we prepare to fight.

If we unite, we can fight them, and we won’t be fighting alone.

Labor brothers and sisters! Rise up like clockwork. waking up from sleep – Became a mass of people that could not be subdued
Contact: Secretary of the Northern Labor Network, Suphalak Bamrungkit 095-687-7707