Ceramic and tile workers of Neuquén
14-year history, 14 years of struggle
28/07/2012
Date Thursday July 26, 2012
It is the end of a new mandate of the Executive Committee of the Ceramics Tile Worker’s Trade Union of the Neuquen province. On this Saturday 28th there will be an assembly where the report and balance sheet of last 3 years will be discussed and also the electoral board will be chosen. The trade union caucasus called Lista Marron, who recovered the shop steward in 1998 and then the trade union, have written pages on the struggle that marked the workers’ history in Neuquen and around the country. This trajectory, also has had big repercussions internationally. The Lista Marrón, founded by workers of the PTS (Partido de los Trabajadores Socialistas), was born to fight in defence of workers’ rights and for a policy that is independent from the bosses, the government and the trade union bureaucracy. Since the recovery of the shop steward and then the trade union, they have been fighting for better salaries, in defence of health and safety conditions to prevent industrial accidents faced with one of the largest national economic crisis (in Argentina, 2001) which left millions of people unemployed. Since 2000, it has been working for the unity of workers inside and outside of the ceramic factories. Creating solidarity networks with different struggling sectors, with the unemployed, teachers, public workers, high school and college students. It has built the Coordinadora Regional de Alto Valle (the Regional Coordinating Committee of the region Alto Valle) which during the last years was a very important tool in the fight against the treason of union bureaucracy. All the leaders have rotated and went back to work to their original jobs and many of the best activists took part in the organisation of workers’ self management of the factory that allowed them to set up a factory when all of the workers had been thrown out into the street. When thousands of workers were laid off, these ceramic tile workers showed that “a factory without bosses can work but it is not the case without workers”. And they demonstrated again in the city of Cutral-Có what they can do facing the attempt of the Stefani factory bosses wanted to empty the factory. Before this new election and for the fourth generation of leaders, a new group of female and male workers are standing in the election with the aim of continuing and carrying forward the pending task with the same determination. To complete the expropriation, for a technological renovation, and for a plan that prioritizes public works done by initiatives of workers’ self management. For the expropriation and nationalization without payment and under workers’ control of Stefani. For the project of reactivation of the Ceramica Del Sur (Southern Ceramics). These and other proposals, together with the candidates standing in the Lista Marrón will be voted for on Saturday August 4th in an open plenary to continuing the democratic method of the ceramic tile workers which is already a tradition.
correspondent
Workers World
