ILC INTERNATIONAL NEWSLETTER NO. 144
A dossier of weekly information published by the International
Liaison Committee of Workers and Peoples
August 9, 2005
To contact us:
ILC International Newsletter
International Liaison Committee of Workers and Peoples
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PRESENTATION:
In a few days' time the "Continental Conference of the Americas
for the nationalization of oil and gas in Bolivia, against
privatizations and national sovereignty" will be held in La Paz
(Bolivia) on August 12, 13 and 14, 2005.
The COB (Bolivian Federation of Workers) its mining federation and the
International Liaison Committee of Workers and Peoples are calling the
conference.
Delegations from Brazil, Mexico, Perú, United States, Ecuador,
Argentina, Paraguay, Chile and Uruguay will be present as well as others
from other continents.
IN this issue we publish interviews given by Brazilian railroad workers
after the withdrawal of the 'provisional measure' that would have opened
the way to privatization of the Brazilian railroads. This withdrawal is
a victory.
In preparation for the conference we publish a report from our
correspondent in Venezuela on "the announcement made by President
Chavez to expropriate 1149 companies."
You will also find the third part of Roger Sandri's report on the reform
of the UN: "Participative democracy and the non governmental
organizations," and Daniel Gluckstein's second and final answer on
the subject of the "XII international meeting for the defense of
ILO conventions, and the independence of labor organizations," held
in Geneva.
We received a declaration from The Moroccan Labor Union, demanding the
maintenance of the SMIG.
Please don't forget to renew your subscription, we need your support.
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Pg, 1.: Presentation
Pg. 2, 3: "The Reform of the UN"-report by Roger Sandri
(3rd part)
Pg. 4, 5: XII meeting in Geneva-reply by Daniel Gluckstein (last
part)
Pg. 6.: Morocco-"No to the dismantlement of the SMIG"
Pg. 7.: Conference of the Americas-two interviews with Brazilian
railroad workers
Pg. 8.: Conference of the Americas-President Chavez announces the
expropriation of 1149 companies
Subscriptions
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THE REFORM OF THE UN
A contribution by Roger Sandri (third part)
Participative democracy and the non-governmental organizations
1989 saw the outbreak of worldwide confrontations. The breakdown of
Stalinist systems opens the door to the capitalist system and its means
of production. Some have seen this event as "the end of a bygone
era."
The agony of the Stalinist system, the vehicle for a false proletarian
ideology yet coercive and exploitative in its practice of freedom will
indirectly have secondary effects. The fear it inspired among
capitalists being extinguished, the ruling classes will confine
themselves to a progressive denial of all social commitments.
Spurred on by conquered governments that have become the immense
majority, whatever their label, globalized uniformity will give birth to
what will be named "the dominant ideology."
Former dissident Alexandre Zinoviev is quite clear on this subject:
"Today the socialists in power in most European countries are
carrying out a policy of social dismantlement that destroys everything
that was socialist in capitalist countries." (1)
Confirming Zinoviev's thought, Jacques Attali, former counselor of
Mitterand, said in Le Figaro, May 5, 2004: "It is under the left
that the distance between the income from work and that of capital have
worsened." Let us remember that this 'left' included socialists,
radicals and communists.
The nation-state, product of the French Revolution of 1789, gave birth
to political democracy. Daily w note that the announced "end of a
bygone era" has not brought an end to the antagonism between the
social classes but quite the contrary.
Globally, the referendum of May 29, 2005 in Europe is the most obvious
example.
As history has shown, social tensions often find their culmination in
political upheavals. For the multilateral system and the holders of a
global economy, political democracy is not in a position to channel the
protests. only to encourage them. Therefore the need to put them in a
framework through the installation of a "participative
democracy" on a worldwide basis, which will be the basis of the
"new governance", on the agenda of the General Assembly of the
UN planned for September 2005.
With this orientation where the institutions of globalization set the
objectives, headed by the IMF, the World Bank and the OECD, the concept
of this participative democracy is evident on the occasion of meetings
such as the "Davos Summit" where capitalists of the world
congregate.
In order to make a counterpoint and not do injury to Montesquieu in his
Spirit of the Laws we will incite the representatives of the "work
force", often self-proclaimed, to create this opposing mass. That
is how the Forum of Porto Alegre was born in Brazil, officially
enthroning the "participative democracy". Everything has
already been said on this subject and I will not refer to it again.
On this doctrinal plan it is clear that for the globalizers and the
alter-globalizers the nation-state is now obsolete. In this manner the
days of the "political democracy" linked to the nation-state
are numbered.
Universalism becomes the new formula of unity between the peoples in
search of an institutional convergence allowing procedures for the
"common good", a sort of business, social and political
association that rejects the concept of "outdated class wars."
(sic)
The "new governance" will be born from this, functioning on
the basis of "participative democracy."
Behind this attractive conceptual expression the objective is to
associate "world governance" with al the economic and social
forces. The class problems must give way to questions of society
understood in the most perfect 'conviviality."
In effect it is the association of capital and labor, revisited in a
globalized dimension.
The political and social history of France has known all social theories
with an ecumenical connotation due to the important place held by the
Catholic Church and its social doctrine. Class wars are not a principle:
it is an inescapable social fact. Marx and Engels have already given an
indisputable historic explanation.
During each period of strong social tensions including the advent of
fascism and nation-socialism, class wars were constantly at the center
of the political psychodrama.
Firstly the advent of the "community society" defined in the
total state, passed through the liquidation of political parties and a
pluralist framework in which they encouraged the citizen's debate in
favor of a single party, guardian of truth.
The same applies to worker trade unionism.
The advent of the "community society" in denying class wars
requires the integration of it in its structure through willing or
forceful association, according to historic development, with all
decisions taken by the 'new governance'.
"Participative democracy", I repeat, denies the existence of
social classes with antagonistic social interests, as it denies the
contradictions of interests born of the capitalist production mode.
It is the reason why the globalist tendency leads to the destruction of
traditional political structures, founded on the existence of
nation-states.
From this there are those that deduce that the days of the nation state,
hierarchically structured are numbered, while on the contrary the
organization of political domination in the form of links, in which the
nation states are abolished, opens new possibilities for action in a
globalized economy and culture.
Actually it is about substituting the international order constituted by
nation-states, regulated by "democratic policy" a "cosmo-political"
order founded only on individuals, denying in fact the existence of
social classes in favor of a neo-totalitarianism.
In such a divided context, at one time or another, the gregarious
instinct of individuals will guide them towards a re-grouping no longer
founded on social classes, in the case of the breakdown of avant-garde
labor organizations, but towards religious and ethnic communities, that
is to say in a singular return to barbarism. Concerning
"equality" produced by the republican exception; it is an
epigraph to the concept of "positive discrimination."
With the promotion of "participative democracy" certain
sectors of world society are invited to campaign even more for the
advent of the new economic and political world order.
In this system the preponderant function is given to non-governmental
organizations (NGO's) for the restructuring of the "world
governance."
Knowing (see below) the history of these NGO's and their increasingly
preponderant place in the general system of "participative
democracy" we can better understand what the terms such as
"civil society", NGO, and "new governance" mean.
The worker organizations are also threatened, on an international level
and consequently on the national level.
The fusion foreseen in 2006 of the ICFTU and the CMT (?) is not planned
by chance. It poses serious problems, and there are those that already
envisage the transformation of the new federation into an NGO.
What is there to ask ourselves?
The NGO's, wheels of state privatization
Through an able media manipulation the NGO's have gained and
increasingly larger presence in communications in inverse proportion to
their political representation. The ecological current with José Bové
in France behaves like the traveling companion of the ecolo-left
influence, is the delight of journalists, especially in regard to the
aversion he expresses vis a vis the international labor movement.
If the origin of the NGO's dates back to the middle of the 19th century,
it is only at the end of the Second World War and the symbolic date June
26, 1945, when the Charter of the United Nations was signed in San
Francisco that the NGO's receive recognition through an international
treaty with a universal play.
Article 71 of the Charter foresees: "The Economic and Social
Council can take useful steps to consult the NGO's that deal with
questions related to their know how. These dispositions can be applied
to international organizations, or where applicable to national
organizations after consultation with the interested member of the
organization." For the first time the term "non-governmental
organization" appears in the official vocabulary. (2)
Since 1989 starting point of the global and globalized order, the
democratic structures and the institutions that represent it are
gradually set aside. Whether it is about political parties, living
bodies of democracy or worker trade unionism in the widest sense of the
term, that ensures the social skeleton, for the superstructures of
global economy, their functions belong to the past.
COMMUNITARIANISM CONCEPT
The concept of communitarianism that encourages globalized
institutions on behalf of multinational capitalism and U.S. imperialism
will contribute to the emergence of a new type of NGO charged with
accompanying the globalized strategy and financed in their operations by
the World Bank, the IMF and transnational societies. The World Bank in
particular was an important factor in the financing of the Social Forum
of Porto Alegre.
Globally from 1985-86, the World Bank increases subsidies destined to be
administrated by the NGO's that along the way pocket generous
commissions. The proportion of projects of the World Bank increases from
5% in 1988 to 47% then to over 50% in 1997. On the other hand the
European Union an important supplier of funds on a world scale, channels
over 60% its aid through the NGO's. Similar percentages are being given
to the large cooperative agencies in the United States and Japan. (2)
The rivalry between northern and southern NGO's lead the first to doubt
the honesty of the second suspecting them, probably with good reason,
they serve as links to their respective governments, far more than real
support for local populations.
Are the NGO's the beacon of the global economy and multinational
expansion? No doubt true. To numerous observers they play a certain role
in the development of integral liberalism and in the withdrawal of
nation-states.
The "Washington consensus" foresees the states must renounce
their authority on public services. In the magazine Alter-eco, No. 190 a
commentator wrote: "The NGO's are, in the final instance, a
mechanism for privatization of the state. This arises from certain
social or powerful functions offloaded on them. Thus understood, civil
society is a mechanism for economic accumulation thanks to fiscal and
customs exemptions available to the NGO's, up to a certain point a
modern version of "Tax free land property!"
(1) Serge Halimi, Le Grand Bond en arriere, Fayard
(2) Francois Rubio, Les NGO's: actors of globalization, French
documentation
********************
XII International Meeting for the defense of ILO conventions and the
independence of trade union organizations - Geneva, June 12, 2005
Reply by Daniel Gluckstein, coordinator of the International Liaison
Committee of Workers and Peoples (final part)
Once this was well established there came a second stage: if one
must find solutions one cannot be satisfied only with people who suffer
the consequences. One must discuss this with the leaders. Then there is
a final stage, at the last Social Forum of Porto Alegre, representatives
of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank were invited.
There was a big debate with them.
Information says: how can we fight poverty together? Do you realize what
that means? You are asking the murderer how to fight against murders!
You are asking the poor and the hungry how to fight together against
poverty!
This happened last January. Everybody argued with them: how to fight
poverty? You have imposing reports, since these people are intelligent.
The representative of the World Bank in an official report said:
"We recognize that our policies have had disastrous effects and
have increased poverty in Africa and Asia. We have learned from our
errors and we will correct our ways. " The representatives of the
IMF said: it's true the plans of structural adjustment that we have
imposed had extremely negative secondary effects. We have thought about
it and will not repeat this.
We must add that in a certain number of countries in Africa, where
nothing more can be imposed; obviously they will have to do otherwise.
But this is not enough. It is under the aegis of President Lula, that
the "Bridge Initiative" has been set up, that is to say the
permanent liaison committee between the representatives of the Davos
Forum and the representatives of the Porto Alegre Forum. In a few days
this permanent committee will meet in Paris for an international
conference with three representatives from the Porto Alegre Forum and
three representatives from the Davos Forum. The knot is tied. The trade
unions already dissolved in the Social Forum that is in turn dissolved
in the dialogue with the IMF and the World Bank, will get together on
the Bridge Initiative. It is an organic, totalitarian society. There are
no social classes or diverse interests.
In the European tradition which is also mine and I hope this will not
shock anyone I would say: we are all brothers in Jesus Christ. You can
all be brothers with whom ever you choose. And through this common
belonging to the human community there's nothing left but for us to sit
down around the same table and reflect on how to face the world's
problems whose origin is not found in class wars, in capitalist
exploitation but in a sort of fatality on which we should all reflect
together and eventually pray together because nothing else can be done.
This has a name: it is corporativism in an attenuated form, gentle, open
and sympathetic, with subsistence for all who want to participate. But
there's no difference in nature between that and totalitarian regimes
which in the thirties in Europe it was said: "the trade unions can
only exist as a component of the State." There's no difference.
There is a difference in the form but not in the content. This is the
question that confronts the labor movement. It is about knowing if the
organizations that the working class has built in order to defend itself
as a class must take this road or not.
From this point of view I think that comrade Bayla Sow of Senegal was
right in saying: "it is not the role of the ILO to open its doors
to civil society." There is a discussion within the labor movement
as to the repercussions on what is happening there. I would like two
pose two questions that seem important.
Firstly, the debate put forward by comrade Djemal, and taken up by
Patrick Hebert and other comrades: unity or pluralism? This debate is
not new and can be continued. Firstly, pluralism is a right. We are all
supporters of ILO Conventions. The ILO Conventions say: freedom for the
workers to form trade unions of their choice. Therefore if we say
freedom for the workers to form trade unions of their choice on
condition that there is only one, then there's no longer freedom. So if
one is in favor of ILO Conventions and the freedom of trade union
organization, one is in favor of recognizing the principle of pluralism.
Once one is in accordance with this another question arises: is
pluralism desirable or prejudicial? I would say it depends on the
circumstance. There is no set rule.
Let us take a concrete and current example. I believe that up to the
present the unity shown by trade union organizations in the United
States in one confederation, the AFL-CIO-- even if we criticize its
leadership and these criticisms are legitimate-- was the expression of
the social and political strength of the labor class in the United
States. It would seem that at their next congress the AFL-CIO could
break in half and that half of the members of the AFL-CIO could form a
new type of trade union movement largely NGO'd.
Based on my information, I think this is a blow that will hit the
workers of the United States cutting the AFL-CIO in half, an atomization
that has nothing positive since this is not done on the basis of helping
United States' workers to fight.
But I greatly prefer that the unity of the European Confederation of
Trade Unions be divided into national trade union confederations, as
comrade Patrick said. Because it is a corporative unity that only serves
to place the straight jacket of the European Union on trade union
organizations.
So there are no rules. It depends on how unity is achieved. On the
precise question that I raised in my report, the constitution of a new
international federation based on the dissolution of the ICFTU and the
CMT, when you read the documents I cite, the idea is that this new trade
union federation should be a social component of the World Commerce
Organization. Is this progress? I don't think so. I prefer the ICFTU as
is, warts and all that one can criticize, but that is an international
confederation that groups together national confederations, and
therefore recognizes the prerogatives of trade union confederations in
each country.
I believe this conforms more to the interests of the working class
rather than an organism that wants to cover everything, substitute the
national trade union confederations, since the national federations can
become affiliated directly and therefore denies the existence of the
working class as a class on the scale of each nation, denies the
prerogatives of nations and pretends to insert itself in globalized
institutions.
In this case I fear it is a debate we will have with comrade Djeman and
others, that whatever the sympathetic motivations, which is up to one or
the other in to say: it is a step towards unity or that there will be
many disillusions and damages that derive from it and that on the
contrary one must be concerned for the reasons I have indicated.
A German comrade asked another question on the repercussions on national
trade union organizations. It is true comrades there is much
restructuring in our various organizations. He raises an interesting
problem since the question does not arise in the same manner in all
countries, there is a tendency in most of our countries that the trade
union structure has a connection with the collective rights gained by
the workers. The form of national federations or national trade unions
is a fragment of the geography of collective rights gained, branch
agreements made, etc. In the example he gives on how the 'super
federation' Ver.di was constituted in contempt of all real relations
with the collective rights gained, he poses a problem that does not hold
not true for Germany alone.
The question was concretely raised in France. The CGT confederation has
planned a reform of statutes that consists in changing 21,000 base trade
unions into 7,000; 30 or so federations into eight and several hundred
departmental unions to 20 or so regional unions.
Also proposed is the establishment of what are called inter-professional
trade unions that will no longer be included in collective bargaining,
the statute, or the specific agreement of a sector, but would have a
character breaking all these relations. Comrades, if a trade union is
not linked with the specific defense of such a collective convention,
with a branch agreement, with a statute, what does it have in common?
The minimum base, the general social legislation of the country. When
this is done at the precise moment when in the social legislation of the
country they want to establish a contract of first employment that
breaks the labor contract, only one thing will be left:
individualization and atomization.
That is to say that every worker can join a trade union but without
relation to collective rights since these collective rights are in the
process of being atomized. This problem arises not only in Germany or
France of in the United States, but in many trade unions. I believe that
when we say "in defense of the ILO Conventions" it is connect
to "defense of collective bargaining, defense of the statutes,
defense of the labor codes, as obtained in each country and that
includes "defense of the manner of trade union organization as
freely organized by the working class" in relation with all forms
of their conquests.
I believe this is extremely important to all of us. It is not a question
of interfering in any country but rather to warn: that in all the
countries of the world, almost simultaneously, projects for
restructuring trade unions are underway as if this were spontaneous.
That all these projects have in common, in different degrees, the
affirmation that there are too many federations and it is necessary to
fuse them, too many trade unions and it is necessary to fuse them, etc.
Doesn't this question, in most cases, collective rights? There is a
relationship. Therefore: let us be wary of the processes that are
developing in our organizations, because there is a relationship between
structural reforms and counter reforms on collective rights.
I have observed that there are contradictory procedures; so much the
better. For example for the first time in 15 years a general strike was
declared by railroad workers in Romania which was legally recognized. It
is interesting because for the first time in 60 years in France, there
is a risk of the adoption of legal dispositions that would question
railroad workers' right to strike and, in general, on public transport.
There was no intention that a moment of a regression in France would
cross with the defense of workers' rights in Romania. There is a
conclusion to be reached. Perhaps it is not urgent to join the European
Union. Because the argument of the right to strike on public transport
is a European directive. In the name of "freedom of
circulation" Europe has already intervened on two occasions to
break a truck drivers' strike in France that affected the free
circulation of goods throughout Europe.
It is important to connect the dots. I thin it is important that our
Romanian comrades have imposed the legal recognition of the general
strike of railroad workers and I hope they will be successful. Next time
there is a railroad workers' strike in France we will bring up the legal
right to it. But relative to the European Union if Romania were a member
of the European Union, a general strike would crash with the Brussels
directives that say: you do not have the right to strike since this
supposes an obstacle to the free circulation of goods.
Up would be up to us. Here we have an open debate we must pursue. No one
can insure that we will succeed. A summary of conclusions was prepared
that in essence says: this is the debate we have opened, we will publish
it through all our methods, that is to say publishing all the debates
and acting in the manner we have always done, that these debates
circulate throughout the labor movement, that the comrades are informed
and that our respective organizations can discuss.
That does not excuse us from carrying on a series of precise campaigns.
They can be modest, but the delegate from Senegal recalled that another
comrade, one of those jailed, is now present here. Two years ago we
demanded the release of these comrades, and finally they were released
Before they left I had a long debate with our Venezuelan comrades. We
asked them their opinion on what happened at the ILO. They replied: no
doubt there is something unacceptable in the fact that, under the aegis
of trade union rights, they have questioned the sovereignty of the
government of Venezuela, because the principal decision taken by the ILO
on Venezuela they indicated it was not right to hamper the freedom of
movement of those who had organized a coup d'état last year. In
general, despite everything, the sovereignty of states and governments
is recognized and the fact that someone has participated in a coup d'état
must be liable before the law.
Aside from this the comrades indicated that the greatest threats to the
UNT and Venezuela have not as yet been realized. They were not
successful because there is an international campaign that we planned
with our comrades in Caracas last February by indicating: we will
address the group of workers, that is to say the worker organizations of
the whole world to say: this is the real situation in Venezuela, there
is no need to condemn Venezuela for violation of trade union freedoms.
When we decided on this campaign last February in Caracas, in a meeting
with our comrades, the UNT of Venezuela was relatively isolated from the
international labor movement, because an giant campaign had been put
forward by a number of people to say: there is no trade union freedom in
Venezuela.
We undertook this campaign and the comrades indicated it had an
extremely positive effect. Therefore we have decided along with them, to
continue this campaign in a certain way. As of tomorrow, we will prepare
a document explaining what has taken place at the general assembly of
the ILO. We will send it to the entire world. We will alert our
comrades. We will invite the whole world to participate in a UNT
congress at the end of July, to prove up to what point trade union
freedom is recognized in this country. In November, when the subject
will again be presented to the board of the ILO, we will return with all
the elements of the campaign.
You have heard what our Romanian comrades said about the Cozma case. I
hope he has been released. This said, the experience has taught us to be
prudent. I believe it is wise to present the complaint in a legal manner
tomorrow. I think we should make the commitment at this conference that
if Cozma is not released, we will continue the international campaign we
have been carrying on for many years.
In the third place I have taken into account the campaign in support of
the complaint presented by our comrades in Bangladesh.
In the fourth place I have taken into consideration the proposal of our
comrade Jacques Paris, and I think he is right in developing a campaign
addressed to youth on an international scale, starting with what he
explains has happened at the ILO, especially taking into account we
discussed in all our countries, with the comrades from Algiers. It is
the same process as in France, except that in Algiers it has started
earlier. In all countries the actual offensive of deregulation of
collective rights of the working class is concentrated on the youth.
That is to say you is taken as a lever to generalize what is called
"informal work" in Africa or Asia. It is coming to Europe: it
is work devoid of all collective rights and guarantees.
Beware, there are trade union organizations in France the retransmit
this demanding for example "professional social security" or
the "new statute for the salaried employee" that is a form of
individualization of the rights, which, in the final instance,
correspond to the generalization of informal work. I think that it would
be necessary to reply, in a convenient form, from the information given
by Paris, to the call for an international campaign.
I agree with everything he says on the question of the cancellation of
the debt-these are positions we have always defended, but I took into
account the information given by Paul Nkunzimana relative to Burundi. If
we confirm that the president of the Burundi trade union federation has
been harassed because he participated in the general assembly of the ILO,
it is unusual for a trade union leader to be harassed for this reason.
I have put this in relation to what Paul has explained on the decline of
the situation in Burundi. I believe we must take this seriously. If this
information is correct, we should organize an international campaign
directed to all labor organizations to ask them for their united
support. This means that initially a comrade is to be intimidated an
next, the trade union will be prohibited and after that an offensive
will be unleashed for a new, falsely ethnic explosion in Burundi.
Comrades these are the conclusions reached with respect not only in time
but above all for the norms that are ours. The International Agreement,
is not in competition with any existing labor organization. We are not
here to take decisions through votes. We register the debate taking
place and proceed to its publication. We carry out campaigns that I am
convinced meet with everyone's approval. I integrate in these
campaigns-Julio Turra spoke of them and I want to insist-the document
prepared in support of the comrades who are occupying the factories in
Brazil and to comrade Serge Goulart who is threatened with repression. I
believe all our comrades who are in agreement with it, will make a
statement of support. This is part of the help one can give our
comrades.
Therefore comrades, in accordance with our norms, we will inform the
respective organizations to which we belong. We will maintain the debate
within these organizations. We have seen this does work. Let us
continue.
*******************
MOROCCO
NO TO THE DISMANTLEMENT OF THE SMIG (minimum wage)
In agreement with the National Secretariat of the Moroccan Labor Union
we publish this declaration. (The UMT is the Moroccan trade union
founded in 1955 in Casablanca and affiliated with the ICFTU.)
1. After having analyzed for several years that the reform of the
labor code was the only solution to the crisis of the growth and
competitiveness of its companies, the representatives of the employers
are presently carrying on a campaign to suppress the guaranteed minimum
wage and its replacement at lower levels by sectored minimums and
regional. They justify their demands by the competition from foreign
products and services that threaten their competitivity, employment and
the viability of Moroccan companies. We share the concern of the
employers but not their analysis of the situation. The solutions they
recommend are false and dangerous. This is why:
2. The level of the minimum wage is not the only factor of investment,
or the only condition affecting competitiveness. If that were the case,
the more under developed countries would be the first to receive foreign
investment and the first suppliers of the world market. The example of
China is the false example par excellence. The attraction and the
performance in these countries is explained by the emergence of an
internal market and by the political choices assumed by the employers
and the ruling class in the matter of education and formation and
technological capacity, bank financing, and specialization of products
and services.
3. To regionalize or sectorize minimum wages would be to break the
inter-professional significance and the national character of the
minimum decency that the law guarantees in the definition of income of
those who work.
4. The minimum wage is just a technical grandeur established according
to the offer and demand of a market of employment services between
employers and workers. It is the minimum purchasing power that is up to
public powers to define In their capacity it is their duty to protect
the security and the cohesion of society. The only time that the SMIG
had a regional definition was precisely during the colonial regime when
national cohesion was more of a threat than a priority.
5. Over 40% of the wages declared to the Social Security Fund are
calculated on a monthly-reduced basis below the legal minimum. The
dismantling of the SMIG would threaten in the short tem the companies
and the stability of the country. That would amount to giving the force
of law to disloyal competition that is a plague already hitting honest
and transparent companies. The professional relations would become
forced and brutal relations. Regional balances would increase.
6. Free exchange is a reality that presents constraints but that offers
the chances for growth and development. It has allowed countries such as
Asia, America and Africa to emerge from under-development. But it has
rules that have nothing to do with slogans and dogmatic recipes through
which the state and elite leaders have since 1995, chosen to undertake
the liberalization of the economy. The agreements of free exchange,
principally with the European Union and the United States were concluded
in a hasty and improvised fashion, without studying the impact and
reasoned strategies. The formulas for privatizations instead of serving
the future will be squandered by operational expenses.
7. Morocco is going through a complex phase where the difficulties of
the situation widen and are increased by structural imbalances and that
call for courageous reforms, fundamental and without demagogy. The
re-establishment of the authority of the law and the end of privileges
and exemptions on social contributions, fiscal obligations, the payment
of the minimum wage, the dismantling of the wide network of contraband
that kills local production, fiscal reform in the sense of justice in
favor of employees and the labor force, the re-launch of popular
consumption, the definition of sector and regional objectives to growth
oriented towards the satisfaction of the vital needs and interests of
citizens, a true administrative reform in the sense of transparency and
efficiency, etc.
8. Above all the Establishment of popular confidence, and the
development of the attractiveness of Morocco cannot just remain as
slogans, myths of improvised measures. The human resources of our
country, their youth and their qualification, the natural resources of
Morocco, its geographic situation will be the trump card to bridge with
confidence and success the challenges of globalization in order to put
the country back on its feet.
9. It is in the spirit of the UMT that we call on the employers and
public powers to not mistake their objective: the dismantling of the
SMIG is just an escape from under bidding and social precariousness for
the entire population.
10. Rejecting all resignation to the logic of under-development, the UMT
reminds us of the interest and urgency of a resuming collective
bargaining on the level of sectors and branches and companies for the
definition of plans for growth based on confidence and ensuring the
workers clear perspectives on their legitimate rights to decent wages
and to an equitable participation in income and wealth.
Casablanca, July 25, 2005
The National Secretariat
****************
Continental Conference of the Americas in La Paz (August 12, 13 and
14, 2005)
The Continental Conference of the Americas "for the nationalization
of oil and gas in Bolivia, against privatizations and for national
sovereignty" will be held in La Paz, Bolivia on August 12, 13 and
14. It will be preceded on Friday evening by an international worker
meeting at El Alto, the large popular suburb that overhangs La Paz and
from where the popular uprising that got rid of the president of the
republic came from two months ago and started a crisis in Bolivia that
is still in course. It is also in El Alto in the heat of revolutionary
mobilization of the masses at the beginning of June, that a
"Popular National Assembly" was constituted gathering together
the labor delegates and their organizations, before institutions-The
National Assembly and the presidency of the republic-rejected by the
masses, the insistence of the immediate nationalization of oil and gas,
the rejection of the dismemberment of the country, and demand for a
sovereign constituent Assembly.
The conference in La Paz was called on the initiative of the Central
Bolivian Workers (trade union) (COB), its mining federation and the
International Liaison Committee of Workers and Peoples among others.
Numerous trade unions and labor organizations from Brazil, Mexico, Peru,
United States, Ecuador, Argentina, Paraguay, Chile, and Uruguay will be
present. An important delegation for the National Workers Union (UNT) of
Venezuela will also be present along with delegates from France, Spain,
etc.
The General Union of Workers of Algeria (UGTA) have decided to send a
delegation to this conference, as they consider that the fight for the
ownership of the immense oil and gas reserves that exist in Algeria as
fundamental.
In Brazil, the federation of petroleum workers (FUP-CUT), the unemployed
(FNIST-CUT), radio and television workers (FITERT-CUT), airport workers,
the coordination of occupied factories (cipla-Interfibra, Flasko,
Flakepete and Profiplast) will also be present in La Paz.
The questions to be debated at this conference are the same as those
posed throughout the world, as is testified in the two interviews that
we publish below, carried out last July after the national conference of
unemployed in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Julio Turra
----------------------
Valmir de Lemos "Indio" as his comrades call him, is the
president of the unemployed trade union of central Brazil.
You have obtained a first victory with the removal of the provisional
measures (MP) that would have caused the extinction of the national
Brazilian railroad company (RFFSA). What is the next step?
With this withdrawal the trade union movement has gained a partial
victory. It required nearly three months spent permanently in Brasilia,
over 100,000 signatures, organizing the railroad workers and the
population. We called for numerous demonstrations throughout the
country. We have won our first victory, but we haven't won the war. We
need to take strength from this first partial result to widen the
mobilization of workers and all the social forces.
What would "winning the war" be according to you?
To re-conquer the national railroad network! That is the objective
of the national conference that meets today in Rio with railroad workers
from all over Brazil, all the trade unions, associations, and
personalities who have supported us for a long time.
We work on the basis of a law draft for revitalizing the national
railroad network, for the defense of the public patrimony and the growth
of the country.
It is evident that in this battle the problem of the expiration of older
contracts will arise with the large private groups that divided the
railroad network and have reduced it to its present calamitous state.
It is a question that arises in other countries in regard to oil,
electricity, and energy. In Brazil it has been proven that the railroads
constitute a determining element for our development. If there is the
will and a worker organization, the population and society to recuperate
these contracts that were really a steal, and recuperate the network of
the national railroads. That is our objective.
You have heard about the proposal for a continental conference in La
Paz. What do you think of this proposal?
I think this can be of interest for the whole continent. Here, in
Brazil, besides the question of the railroads we have the problem of
Petrobras. Despite the promises of stopping privatizations, the
government plans within the next few weeks the seventh auction for oil
deposits in Brazil. There is also the problem of "concessions"
in telecommunications.
We see how the sovereignty of the country is being assaulted, the
resources that belong to the people, the quality of services that are
offered them. I hope that the La Paz conference will be the occasion to
assemble all these struggles so that can strengthen each other.
------------------
Raul de Bouis is one of the directors of the Brazilian companies of
urban trains (CBTU). On July 14 he was a participant at a national trade
union conference for unemployed in Rio de Janeiro.
This conference meeting the day after the victory gained by the
Brazilian railroad workers who forced the withdrawal of the provisional
measures (MP) that decreed the termination of the RFFSA (Brazilian
Railroads) which was the order of the day at the national congress.
The proposal was made for the draft of a law to re-nationalize the RFFSA
on which basis the trade union federation would undertake a vast
national campaign. The debate on this law in all the trade unions, the
workplaces will finish at the end of August with a new national
conference in Salvador de Bahia, where the national campaign will be
launched.
The delegates from the federation of railroad workers of the CUT will be
present in La Paz.
Can you explain under what circumstances the RFFSA was created and what
is its present situation?
In 1957 we had 60 regional railroad networks in Brazil. In 1957 the
federal government, Juscelino Kubitscheck, who founded Brasilia the new
capital of Brazil, created a federal institution destined to regroup the
regional networks into one organism. That is how the Federal Railroad
Network SA (RFFSA) was born.
For over 20 years Brazil made a great effort, despite all difficulties,
to strengthen this national organization. Coordination of equipment,
integration of the networks, improvement of productivity, etc. Then
there was a turning point. Firstly the freight service was separated
from the urban passenger service. In 1984 the Brazilian Company of Urban
Trains (CBTU) was created. From 1984 up until the end of the e 90's we
saw the progressive disappearance of local, regional and finally
national passenger trains. Nowadays it has practically disappeared.
Then in 1993 the railroad network was included in the "plan of
denationalization." The railroad network considerably weakened
after years without any further investment by the state was almost sold
off cheaply and turned over to private initiative. The sale drew
ridiculous prices that did not correspond to the patrimony invested. The
contracts were reduced to the minimum, under the pretext that the
network was so degraded that one could not hope for anything better.
It was only five years later that a regulatory agency was created. It
was in the hands of those who had overseen the process of liquidation
and selling off of the network.
The large industrial and financial groups, interested in the transport
of their own production-mining companies, soy producers, et al-grabbed
the freight network.
We have sadly lived through a process of destruction of what was the
grand goal of national development.
Unfortunately we must note that our government (Lula, Ed.Note) that we
have elected on the promises of change has reversed the process. On the
contrary, we have seen it undertake a provisional measure decreeing the
extinction of the RFFSA. Fortunately the mobilization of the railroad
workers has prevented this measure being presented to congress.
What does this retreat mean?
It is a new opportunity. An opportunity to restart the debate, to
unite the social forces that are in favor of the reconstruction and to
raise before the government the demand for a national railroad
institution that can respond to the interest of the population and the
nation.
Over these last years we have suffered a terrible degradation of the
patrimony of the RFFSA. Thousands of kilometers of rail have been
destroyed, cup up into bits, sold as scrap metal, hundreds of buildings
have been abandoned and partially destroyed (for example the disused
station, in ruins, where the trade union conference was held-(Estacao
Leopoldina that along with the Central do Brazil station was one of the
great station of Rio de Janeiro.Ed.Note.) and hundreds of excellent
workshops have been closed. All for the benefit of those big capitalists
groups, that have used what they needed and abandoned the rest.
This is not an easy situation. The government has not shown any
disposition towards a change in policy. But there is an opportunity, and
we should be able to grab it.
What do you think of the proposal made by the federation of miners in
Bolivia, the COB and the ILC for a continental conference for the
defense of the nationalization of hydrocarbons in Bolivia, the fight
against privatization and for the sovereignty of nations?
The question of Bolivian oil, the railroad network in Brazil, all
these question pose the same problem that is in fact planetary. These
are the relations between capital and nations, societies and peoples. I
noted during your speech that France, a country of important conquests,
richer and older than Brazil, suffers terribly the predatory policy. In
reality the fight we must undertake is not localized, it is planetary,
and I have the greatest respect for the initiatives of such a conference
whose goal is to fight in order to give the peoples and nations control
over their resources and their sovereignty.
*******************
VENEZUELA
President Chavez announces the expropriation of 1149 companies
President Hugo Chavez has just announced on television that, "If
the bosses do not want to reopen the factories (in bankruptcy or
insufficiently active -editor's note), we will be obliged to expropriate
and reopen them ourselves." He indicated that the government had a
list of 1149 companies that will be confiscated since that have stopped
production or are producing below capacity. He advised the bosses that
the suspension of productive activities was contrary to the
constitution.
Last January, Chavez decreed the expropriation of two companies-a
large paper manufacturing facility (Venepal) and a company that produces
valves-which the owners had placed into bankruptcy. At The National
Assembly the deputies had approved a decree that declared that these
companies were of "public interest" that had opened the way to
nationalization. Reacting against Chavez' declaration, Fedecamaras, the
bosses organization in Venezuela, declared that it was not the
responsibility of the bosses by "the lack of flexibility of the
labor market and controls on prices and capital exercised by the
government." As one can see in Venezuela as in the rest of the
world and in France, the demands of capital are always the same: they
want the government to dismantle workers' rights and to subject the
sovereignty of the country to the mercy of the "free market."
We are unconditionally on the side of the workers of Venezuela and the
government of Chavez in refusing to give in.
Chavez has indicated that the expropriated companies would operate as
"social production companies" (EPS) and the Brazilian
financial newspaper Valour noted this means "the property will be
held by the state and the corkers' cooperatives." (July 21.)
The point of view of the UNT
Along with the Venezuelan workers, we support the expropriation and
nationalization of these companies, with the objective of saving jobs
and guaranteeing the sovereignty of the people and the nation.
However we share the point of view of Orlando Chirino, leader of the
National Union of workers /UNT) the independent federation of Venezuelan
workers who recently declared: "We warn the workers in regard to
the cooperatives because in the end they favor flexibility of workers'
rights and the generalization of precarious employment, that is exactly
what the "high dignitaries" of the World Bank and the IMF hope
for. The UNT must clearly indicate that cooperatives are not the answer
to unemployment."
The concern of numerous Venezuelan trade union leaders is reinforced by
the fact that at Venepal, the constitution of a cooperative translated
into the dissolution of trade union organizations. The question of
nationalizations and that of the defense of labor organizations will be
at the center of the La Paz conference (August 12 through 14) that a
delegation from the UNT will attend.
Correspondent.
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