Pakistan, May 1, 2026: Build, or Defeat is Your Destiny

For a Militant Federation of the Working Class

On the occasion of May Day, we must unite as one fist against exploitation and oppression, and find the path to freedom.
“The workers have nothing to lose but their chains. But through their struggle, they can win the whole world.”

The Importance of May Day

Every year on May 1st, International Workers’ Day is observed around the world. It is not merely a holiday to respect labor; rather, it is a day of remembrance of struggle and revolutionary resolve – the bloodiest chapter in the working class’s struggle against the capitalist system.
On May 4, 1886, at Haymarket Square in Chicago, the state first created chaos by having an unknown person throw a bomb at workers who had gathered to demand an eight-hour workday, then police opened fire on the peaceful procession, killing several workers and wounding hundreds. Even after that, the state launched a brutal campaign of repression: eight anarchist labor leaders were sentenced to death on false charges. Four of them were hanged on November 11, 1887, even though evidence showed that most of the accused were not even present at the square.

Thus the Haymarket affair became a global symbol of the struggle for workers’ rights. In 1889, the Second International declared May 1st as Workers’ Day, forever linking the memory of the Chicago martyrs to the workers’ struggle.

But today, the ruling class and their neoliberal economists and intellectuals want us to forget this bloody history. They want to turn May Day into a false celebration. We reject that. Every year on this day, we renew our pledge: we will fight until the last chain of the workers’ slavery is broken, until oppression and exploitation are ended.

The History of Workers’ Struggle and the Role of Communist Leadership

Fellow Workers: May Day is a Day of Struggle and Rebellion, Not a Holiday to Celebrate

History bears witness that the greatest leaders of the workers’ movement were those who were themselves workers and continuously studied communism, or those who considered the working class as the most capable class in society. That is why communists have repeatedly spoken of the dictatorship of the proletariat and for the struggle for socialism. History bears witness that communist leaders not only lived with workers and helped advance the production process, but also actively participated in strikes for workers’ rights. Therefore, communists have a natural relationship with the producers – one that is about controlling production and the political method of distribution. This method can never be separated from the workers’ struggle.

It was the study of communism that taught workers that within capitalism, struggles for wages, working hours, poverty, unemployment, national rights, and justice – i.e., partial solutions – can never liberate the working class. Because this system stands on exploitation, profit, and oppression. Therefore, workers must prepare for the broad resolution: the end of capitalism, collective ownership of factories and land, and a socialist society where workers themselves own power.

That is why, to this day, communist leaders remain the great heroes of the workers’ movement, while those who consider workers less capable or outdated, or who have acted out of interests and opportunism, are historically dying.

A fundamental truth is that the spirit of the workers’ movement is class struggle and revolution. And this spirit is nourished by communism. The moment you try to separate communism from the workers’ movement, it becomes a lifeless corpse – one that can only beg, not fight.
Historical Evidence:
In 1917, when the workers of Russia launched the socialist revolution, their leaders were Lenin, Trotsky, other communists, and thousands of factory committee activists – all were students of communism. They showed the world what the working class can do when they make communism their weapon. May Day became the symbol of that complete solution – when workers became the owners of their own state.

Similarly, in Pakistan, Mirza Ibrahim (Baba-e-Mazdoor), Faiz Ahmed Faiz, C.R. Aslam – these were worker-leaders who studied communism and never abandoned it. That is why they remain great to this day. They never scared workers away from communism, but showed it as the only path to liberation.

Those worker-leaders who today denounce communism, who frighten workers with the “fear of socialism,” who limit the movement only to wage struggles – they are in fact traitors to the workers’ movement. They are killing the very spirit that once broke chains.
Removing communism from the workers’ movement is treason against its spirit. We must follow in the footsteps of those great worker-leaders who made communism their path. Partial solutions (wages, hours, holidays) are temporary bandaids. The only complete solution is: the end of capitalism, the establishment of socialism, and the workers’ own militant federation that fights until revolution.

The Neoliberal Onslaught and the Crisis of Leadership

War on Workers: Neoliberalism, State Repression, and the Betrayal of Labor Leadership

Today, the working class faces unprecedented global attacks. The enemy is neoliberalism. It is an ideology imposed by the IMF, the World Bank, and the ruling elite of every country. It aggressively demands privatization, deregulation, austerity, and the destruction of trade unions – all in the name of so-called “efficiency” and “profit.”

Globally, the right to strike – the most fundamental weapon of the working class – is being systematically eliminated. According to the 2025 Global Rights Index, the right to strike was violated in 131 out of 151 countries (87%). Employers are openly questioning the right to strike, and governments are submitting to them by enacting laws that criminalize strikes.

An imperialist country like the United States, under the Trump administration, is launching open attacks on U.S. workers, announcing the elimination of 300,000 federal jobs, and unions are being subjected to various legal assaults. The current erosion of workers’ legal rights is not an accident – it is a class war being waged for corporations. Crisis of Leadership:
The trade union movement is in deep crisis. Many labor leaders have turned into forms of the labor aristocracy. This trade union aristocracy has abandoned the political path and become parasites living on donations from capitalists, political parties, and corporations. They have given up militant struggle and sold out workers’ interests for a seat at the table of the exploiters. In Pakistan, mainstream political parties like the PPP, PML-N, and PTI – before coming to power – issue their usual pro-worker statements, but once in power they systematically ignore workers and pass budgets that further impoverish the working class. Therefore, to defeat the betrayal of the reformist and opportunistic labor aristocracy, we must move toward an alternative, militant, revolutionary leadership – one that not only struggles for the achievement of partial demands but whose clear demand is the construction of an alternative system: socialism.

The Condition of the Working Class in Pakistan

Pakistan: A Hell for Workers

Pakistan is a textbook example of capitalist exploitation. The conditions of the working class here are barbaric:
Over 80% of workers in Pakistan are in the informal and unprotected economy – without contracts, social security, or any legal protection. The formal sector provides jobs to less than 20% of the workforce.

In the 2025-26 budget, the federal government did not even announce a minimum wage, even though ILO conventions require a living wage. The minimum wage remains frozen at Rs. 37,000 per month, while inflation is devouring every rupee like a termite.

Pakistan is among 60 countries under investigation by international organizations for forced labor practices. Forced labor and child labor are widespread in brick kilns, agriculture, textiles, and domestic work. In Pakistan, laws exist only on paper; enforcement is zero.

Regular vs. Irregular workers: “Regular” permanent contract workers are a privileged minority. The vast majority are daily wagers, contract workers, and domestic workers who have no job security, paid leave, pension, or any rights. In major cities like Rawalpindi, Lahore, and Karachi, sanitation workers are forced to work in toxic waste without protective gear, and when they fall ill, they are fired because their contracts do not allow paid sick leave.

State repression of unions exists; trade unions are operating under an undeclared ban. Only 1-2% of workers are unionized. Workers who demand their rights face dismissal, torture, false terrorism cases, and enforced disappearance. In Karachi, trade union leader Comrade Iqbal Abro was abducted by police and falsely implicated in terrorism cases simply for organizing workers.

Anti-worker Labor Code: The government has introduced a new “anti-worker black law” designed to strip workers of union rights and legalize the contract system, handing workers over to profiteering contractors. So far, over 40 trade unions have rejected this code.

Appeal for National and International Solidarity

Join the Campaign Against the Ban on Trade Unions in Balochistan

In its decisions of 2013-15, the Balochistan High Court held that employees of government institutions are part of the civil service and therefore cannot form trade unions under the Industrial Relations Act. Following this decision, in 2019-20 the registration of 62 trade unions was cancelled, and further cancellations occurred in 2025. The Balochistan government has stripped workers of their fundamental right to register trade unions under the Industrial Relations Act and is instead granting them the right to form associations under the Balochistan Charity Act (based on amendments to the 1860 Societies Act). Under this Act, trade unions would operate like charitable organizations – meaning they will have no right to collective bargaining. This not only violates International Labour Organization (ILO) Conventions 87 and 98, but also constitutes a grave violation of Article 17 of the Constitution of Pakistan.

Therefore, we appeal to national and international labor organizations, trade union federations, workers’ associations, student federations, democrats, oppressed nationalities, migrants, slum dwellers, journalists, and human rights movements – including the ITUC, ILO, and especially the leadership of the International Labor Solidarity and Struggle Network (ILNSS) – to express solidarity with the workers of Balochistan on May Day through placards, banners, and video messages. Along with your own domestic demands, pressurize the Government of Pakistan to immediately restore the registration of all cancelled unions in Balochistan and grant full trade union rights to all government employees across Pakistan.

This is the reality of capitalist “development”: the worker is crushed, exploited, and then thrown into the garbage bin.

Why We Need a Militant Federation of the Working Class

Our enemy is one; only a militant federation of the working class can fight against it.

The ruling class is organized globally. They have the IMF, the World Bank, multinational corporations, and military dictatorships. They coordinate their attacks across borders. We must respond with our own international, militant organization.

We do not need any more bureaucratic, reformist trade unions that beg the government for mercy. We need a MILITANT FEDERATION OF THE WORKING CLASS – a fighting organization that does not ask for rights but fights for them on the streets, in slums, in factories, in schools, colleges, universities, and villages.

• This federation will fight not only for the rights of industrial workers, but also for:
• Students: against the ban on student unions, the commodification of education, and rising fees.
• Women: against patriarchal oppression, wage discrimination, and violence at the workplace and at home.
• LGBTQI+ community: against all forms of sexual and gender oppression.
• Oppressed nationalities: against ethnic, linguistic, and religious discrimination that divides the working class.
• Neighborhoods and the unemployed: against the destruction of communities by capitalist development, the criminalization of poverty, and for the provision of employment.

Every form of oppression: because every form of oppression is ultimately part of the class system.

This federation must be:

• Militant: unafraid of strikes, protests, and direct action – ready to confront the bosses and the state face-to-face.
• Democratic: not in the hands of bureaucrats, but controlled by rank-and-file workers.
• Internationalist: showing solidarity with workers in India, Bangladesh, Palestine, the United States, and everywhere else.
• Revolutionary: its goal will not be merely higher wages or better conditions within capitalism, but the overthrow of the entire capitalist system and the establishment of a socialist society – where workers own the means of production and the state serves the people, not the profiteers.
• The history of the Russian Revolution teaches us: only when the working class is organized as a class, with its own militant federation and its own revolutionary leadership, can it hope to defeat capitalism and seize power.

The Only Answer to Capitalist Attacks: Unite, Organize, Fight!

The neoliberal attacks on the working class intensify every day. The crisis of leadership is real, but it is not permanent. You are the leaders that you, along with many workers, are waiting for.

On this May Day, we call upon all workers – regular and irregular, employed and unemployed, men and women, students and peasants, homeless people, oppressed nationalities, human rights representatives, and the LGBT+ community – to unite under a single banner: for a militant federation of the working class.

Our struggle demands:

• Rejection of all anti-worker labor codes and laws.
• An immediate halt to attacks on workers’ rights and pensions through privatization, downsizing, and rightsizing policies – to ensure the protection of employment and dignity of the working class.
• Demand an immediate living wage, eight-hour workday, and full social security for all workers.
• For peasants: immediate setting of fair support prices to relieve them from expensive agricultural inputs, water scarcity, and debt burden; subsidies on agricultural inputs (fertilizer, seeds, diesel); provision of interest-free loans; end of corporate capitalist domination; and fair distribution of agricultural land among small farmers to promote agricultural justice and sustainable production.
• Struggle for the unconditional release of all arrested and disappeared labor leaders, human rights activists, and representatives of oppressed nationalities.
• An immediate end to forced evictions of residents of major cities – provide them with natural and legal protection of housing – and fight for this.
• Build our own organizations from the grassroots, independent of all capitalist political parties.
• Prepare for the final struggle against capitalism and imperialism.

The enemy is powerful, but we are many in number. Our condition is solely because of the capitalist system. Only our united power can end capitalism.

Join the movement. Build the militant federation. End the capitalist system.

Long live the international working class!
 Long live workers’ unity!
 Long live the revolution!