Guinea: IUF files 3 OECD complaints over violations at Onomo Hotel Conakry

The IUF has filed complaints with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development against the principal investors in Onomo Hotels for violations of the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises on Responsible Business Conduct: Batipart Invest, Crédit Mutuel Equity and British International Investment. The complaints were filed with the National Contact points for Luxembourg, France and the UK, respectively. The IUF is requesting that the OECD use its good offices to mediate numerous violations of the Guidelines in order to ensure compliance with national law and international standards.

• In the face of a relentless seven-month anti-union campaign which included intimidation, threats, and terminations, workers at Onomo Hotel Conakry won their union on January 4, 2024 and chose to join IUF affiliate FHTRC
• After workers requested union elections in July 2023, management terminated and subcontracted twenty employees; all but two of those workers had signed the union affiliation petition, and many of them had been at the hotel for three or four years, illegally working under "day laborer" status
• The IUF filed complaints with British International Investment (BII), a major investor in Onomo Hotels, over its client's retaliatory subcontracting, but BII closed the complaint without bringing its client into compliance with national law, international standards or BII's own Policy on Responsible Investing

Since winning the union at the Sheraton Grand Conakry in February 2020, FHTRC has successfully won union recognition at the Noom Hotel, Hotel Atlantic View and most recently, Onomo Hotel Conakry. Recently, hotel workers from across Conakry rallied together for reinstatement of the terminated workers at the soon-to-reopen Sheraton Grand Conakry, justice for the Onomo Hotel Conakry workers and respect for all hotel workers in Guinea.

FHTRC union delegate Balouta Camara from Noom Hotel stated: "We have our union. We have a strong relationship with management. Onomo workers deserve the same, and we will do whatever it takes to support them in their struggle."