Struggle for Rights in Azeri Oil Industry

On paper, the perks available to women working in Azerbaijan’s petroleum industry look impressive.

There’s the opportunity for paid maternity leave, cash and extra holiday for those marrying for the first time and days off with pay when the school year begins.

Like all oil workers, they have access to free medical care at a special hospital funded by the State Oil Company of the Republic of Azerbaijan, which with its modern equipment is considered to be one of the best in the country.

At up to 220 US dollars per month, their salaries are also far better than the national average of 100 dollars per month. Azeri labour laws, meanwhile, specifically exclude women from the industry’s dirtier jobs including drilling, heavy lifting and underground repairs.

Female oil workers say this bears no resemblance to the reality of life in the oil industry and say although these priveleges remain on the books they haven’t been observed since the Soviet era.

Mirvari Gahramanli, chair of the non-governmental Committee for the Protection of Oil Workers’ Rights, goes further, saying that the rights of female oil workers in Azerbaijan are being routinely violated.

“These privileges may exist, but female oil workers are put in such conditions that even if they are pregnant they are scared of taking maternity leave, because they may be fired,” she said.

“Women do heavy work. Many of them work on platforms which were built with no observance of labour protection conditions. Their wages are lower than men’s. The conditions of the labour code are not implemented.”

Chimnaz Ismailova is a maintenance engineer at the state oil company. She’s one of a small number of Azeri women running in the upcoming parliamentary election and is campaigning on a platform that includes protecting the rights of women working in the industry.

“Oil workers have a difficult job, both men and women,” said Ismailova, a parliamentary deputy from 1975-1991 who is representing the ruling Yeni Azerbaijan Party in the November 6 poll.

“So we had certain privileges. For example, a 50 per cent discount on electricity and gas, and free use of public transport. However, in 2001 the government cancelled these privileges for everyone, including for oil workers, pensioners, labour veterans and war veterans.

“If I win the elections, I will raise this issue in parliament. Oil workers, because of the difficulty of their job, should have certain privileges. If not the men, then at least the women should.”

Activists say those who work offshore, including at the massive “town in the sea” Neftyanye Kamni - a giant artificial structure in the Caspian complete with roads, dormitories and dining halls - face particular risks. About 70 per cent work at oil processing stations or in laboratories, staying two weeks on the station then and equal time on land, heading home via a two-hour ferry journey.

Workers say they need the time off as the weather is terrible and conditions there are harsh with only salt water for showers as fresh is in short supply. However, the station isn’t as productive as it once was and the government is considering turning it into a museum.

Women first moved into the oil industry during the Second World War, replacing the country’s menfolk who were away fighting. Today, around 16,000 women work at the more than 100 state enterprises which produce and process oil in Azerbaijan. A high percentage are employed in the scientific sphere doing jobs like geological research for companies searching for oil.

Gahramanli says women are often the first to suffer when cutbacks come.

She was fired from her job at the state oil company after more than 20 years. She insists she was being punished for her anti-government views and says her daughter and sister met a similar fate simply because of their family connections.

“To make them write a statement that they were resigning of their own free will, physical force [they were beaten and their arms twisted] was used against them, because they refused to write it,” she said.

A spokesperson from the state oil company declined to comment on the sackings, which happened two years ago, though noted that cutbacks in troubled transitional times occurred throughout the former Soviet Union. Prior to 1991, the oil industry was controlled by the state-run Azneft, run from Moscow. In 2002, the industry was privatised, and many oil enterprises created from Azneft. However, it was only enterprises connected to servicing and utilities that were really privatised, with oil refining facilities remaining under the control of the current state petroleum company.

The spokesperson also denied Gahramanly’s claims that the rights of female oil workers are being exploited.

That view is supported by the chairwoman of the Society of Female Oil Workers, OJN, a state-run body formed to protect oil workers’ rights.

Despite losing her job of 30 years during the reorganisation of Azneft, Solmaz Hajieva says that women working in the industry are no worse off now than in years gone by.

“I can’t say that in Azerbaijan, the rights of women oil workers are violated,” said Hajieva. “This did not happen in the Soviet years and does not happen now. A professional oil worker, in comparison with all others in the country, is comparatively well-paid at state enterprises.”

Oil industry problems including meagre pensions for retired workers are common to both men and women, she said, adding that the OJN is attempting to raise this problem with the government.

Sabira Mustafaeva is an IWPR contributor in Azerbaijan.