[Fresh Ink] Venezuela: Boss's campaign of terror against unionists

[Richard Menec]

http://www.greenleft.org.au/2008/764/39460

Green Left Weekly                 23 August 2008

Venezuela: Boss's campaign of terror against unionists

Federico Fuentes & Kiraz Janicke

The owner of Fundimeca, an air conditioning factory in Valencia, Carabobo, 
is waging an intense campaign of terror and intimidation against the 
factory's work force.

Fundimeca's work force has been fighting to ensure that the company complies 
with Venezuela's constitution and labour laws, in particular an order by the 
labour inspectorate to rehire nine workers.

Fundimeca employs 360 workers, 80% of whom are women.

One worker has been shot in the leg by armed thugs and 18 workers and three 
union leaders are currently facing trial in Carabobo courts, accused of 
various charges including criminal gang activity with the threat of jail 
terms looming over their heads.

Among those standing trial is Stalin Perez Borges, a national coordinator of 
the National Union of Workers (UNT) and Venezuela's principal delegate to 
this year's International Labor Organization convention ? where after seven 
years, the delegation successfully removed Venezuela from the list of 
countries that supposedly violate union freedom.

Perez Borges and a number of the others facing trial are also members of the 
mass-based United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), headed by Venezuelan 
President Hugo Chavez.

Also facing charges is union finance secretary and key leader of the dispute 
Gloria Palomina, who was shot by armed thugs.

Some of those facing trial did not participate at all in the dispute, while 
others have been threatened with charges if they do not resign.

Meanwhile Fundameca boss Jose Ignacio Jaramillo, an anti-Castro Cuban who 
supported the coup attempt against Chavez in 2002, has outrightly refused to 
abide by the law.

He is suspected of being behind the shooting of Palomina yet continues to 
walk free, openly declaring he has enough money to buy all the "justice" he 
needs in Carabobo.

Since the election of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez in 1998, the rights 
of workers have dramatically increased. Using the new constitution and laws 
introduced, a new layer of pro-revolution unions have been organised and 
scored some important successes in the fight for workers rights, including 
in certain instances organising workers to take over the running of 
factories shut by their owners.

This has also led to a reinvigoration of the workers movement, particularly 
after the struggle by workers, together with the community and armed forces, 
to break the back of the bosses strike in December 2002-January 2003 that 
attempted to shut down the state oil company and other important industries.

In response, employers have launched successive attacks against the new 
layer of militant unionists, sacking those that attempt to form new unions 
and demand their rights.

In a number of cases they have benefitted from state bureaucrats who do not 
enforce compliance with pro-worker laws, including counter-revolutionary 
elements within the still-existing capitalist state institutions.

In the case of Fundimeca, evidence points to close collaboration between the 
boss, the local court and the public prosecutions office in order to defeat 
the workers.

The struggle at Fundimeca began on June 26, when the boss refused to enact 
the order of the labour inspectorate of Valencia to rehire nine workers 
sacked last November.

In response, a group of workers decided to go on strike and formed a picket 
line outside the factory.

On June 30, Palomina was shot when two armed men rode up to the picket line 
on motorbikes and told the workers to get back to work. Out of fear for 
their safety, the workers took over the factory that day.

This is just part of the intimidation campaign against the workers, who have 
had their houses monitored day and night, received threatening phone calls 
and been threatened with jail terms if they do not resign.

On July 3 and July 18, the workers were ordered to leave the premises by 
state judge Mauricia Mar?a Gonzalez, who is also a member of the PSUV. The 
workers refused to leave the first time, and the factory was inspected and 
deemed to be in perfect shape.

The second time, following a signed agreement in which the workers would 
leave the factory and the boss would not take reprisal actions and would 
rehire the nine workers, cover the medical costs of Palomina and withdraw 
the charges laid, the workers left the factory.

However, the boss failed to comply with the agreement.

On August 4, the workers were notified that arrest orders had been issued 
against them. Three days later they presented themselves before the 
authorities and were held for almost six hours in a maximum security prison.

They were informed they were being charged with violating private property, 
impeding the right to work and criminal gang activity, among other charges.

Public prosecutor Jaime Alexander Martinez Lugo asked that the workers 
facing court be deprived of liberty until the end of the trial, a request 
rejected by the judge who instead ordered that the accused could not leave 
the state, be in the vicinity of Fundimeca or speak out against the company.

They were warned that if they broke any of these terms they would be 
detained in Tocuyito prison. If found guilty, the workers face several years 
in jail.

Many are asking: given all this, why is the boss - who has still not rehired 
the workers as ordered by the state, is under suspicion for involvement in 
the shooting of a union leader and who continues to threaten other workers ? 
not facing charges or even investigation?

In response, an international campaign has been launched in defence of those 
facing trial. The PSUV candidate for governor of the state of Carabobo, 
Mario Silva, has publicly spoken out against the "outrageous" intimidation 
campaign against the workers.

Silva called for the intervention of the national government to override the 
state courts. A range of grassroots unions and worker federations have also 
joined the call for solidarity.

Unions and solidarity committees are urged to send a fax in support of the 
workers to the Public Prosecutors Office in Valencia at + 58 241 826 9352.

Messages of solidarity can be sent to solidaridadfundimeca at gmail.com. Please 
also consider signing on to the solidarity letter below

Attn: The Public Prosecutors Office No.5 of the city of Valencia, Control 
Tribunal 7 of the city of Valencia, State of Carabobo, Bolivarian Republic 
of Venezuela

We the undersigned union, social and political leaders from different 
countries, demand an immediate end to the judicial persecution of Stalin 
Perez Borges, national coordinator of the National Union of Workers (UNT), 
and the rest of the workers involved to the Fundimeca case.

They are victims of a boss who participated in the 2002 coup attempt, and 
who has refused to comply with an order from the labour inspectorate of the 
state of Carabobo obliging him to rehire nine workers, resulting in 
mobilisations by the workers in the factory in defence of their rights.

Today, the boss hopes to make the workers pay for their just struggle in the 
courts and is subjecting them to measures that deprive them of the right to 
travel outside of the state and threats of jail terms.

It is unjustifiable that in a revolutionary process, like that which 
Venezuela is living through, a judicial system that favours the rich 
continues to prevail and that there exists attempts to criminalise the 
struggle of the workers.

Yet this is being done in the specific case of Fundimeca, with the perverse 
aim of trying to terrorise the struggle of all the workers in the country.

In this sense, we reject the actions of the Public Prosecutors Office and 
the judge involved in the Fundimeca case, essentially because we do not 
accept the criminalisation of the just struggle of workers, because we do 
not accept any coup-plotting plaintiff, less so a boss that refuses to 
comply with the Organic Labour Law and that utilises hired assassins to 
terrorise workers and, finally, because we do not accept any more impunity.

Given all this, we call for a public denunciation of these events in order 
to demand an end to the persecution of the workers involved in the 
Fundimecia case and that the charges against them be dropped.

[To add your name to the letter send an email to 
solidaridadfundimeca at gmail.com. Include your union position or social 
organisation you belong to.]

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