As the year ends, the Building and Wood Workers’ International (BWI) thanks all our affiliates, leaders, organisers, partners, and allies around the world for your solidarity and determination. We are ending this year at a time when democracy is under attack worldwide, and working people are at the heart of this challenge. The rise of far-right and authoritarian forces, and the growing loss of trust in democratic institutions, remind us that democracy is never guaranteed and can never be taken for granted. 

This crisis did not emerge overnight. Workers have been left behind by an economic system that prioritises profit over people. Welfare states have weakened, inequalities have deepened, and trade union rights have been attacked. In many countries, even parties that once claimed to represent labour have adopted right-wing agendas, opening the door to illiberal democracies and even the normalisation of fascist ideas that directly threaten workers’ rights.

Yet workers are not silent. Across Italy, India, Argentina, Tunisia, the United States, and beyond, trade unions are mobilising, pushing back, and resisting. In all 108 countries where BWI is present, our affiliates continue to organise, fight back, and win crucial victories. This collective resistance, and the international solidarity that binds us, remains our strongest response to modern-day authoritarianism.

As we reflect during the holidays, let us be reminded that democracy grows through our working together.  We will not step back. BWI will continue to organise, resist, and build trade unions as schools of democracy. And as we prepare for our 6th World Congress in São Paulo, Brazil, let us move forward with unity and resolve. 

Thank you for a strong 2025, a year of struggle, solidarity, and victories.

Warm holiday wishes to all.

Viva BWI Viva!  

Vamos BWI, Vamos!

In solidarity,

Ambet Yuson

BWI General Secretary