Venezuelan Workers Take Over Vivex Factory and Demand Nationalisation
Thursday, 04 December 2008
a photo from their victory over the company in 2006. Photo by J.
Chaparro (Sintracemex)
On Friday,
November 21, as part of a protracted conflict, 360 workers of Vivex
occupied their factory in the industrial district Los Montones in
Barcelona (Anzoategui). The plant makes windscreens for the car
industry,
and the workers are demanding of President Chavez that he should
nationalise it.
The
immediate reason for the take over of the factory was the non-payment
of the utilidades (profits bonus), which is part of the collective
bargaining agreement. According to trade union leaders Jose Angel
Hall, Darwin Wilche and Pablo Cumana, "the company argues that
it is bankrupt and refuses to pay the 120 days of utilidades that the workers are entitled to". The company told the workers
that they would only pay them for 15 days. The workers replied that
the company should open the books to determine whether it really had
losses or not.
General
secretary of Vivex Workers’ Union (Sintravivex) Jean Sabino,
reported that the workers had “taken over operational control of the
plant, since administrative personnel had left voluntarily”.
The trade union leader said that they would continue to work normally, but that they could not guarantee the distribution of the
finished products until the legal situation of the company is clarified.
Vivex had already been working at 50% capacity for most of the year,
using the lack of access to hard currency to buy raw materials as an
excuse.
This had had a negative effect on other car plants further down in
the production line, particularly Toyota and Mitsubishi (MMC).
The
general secretary of MMC workers union, Felix Martinez, rejected the
claims that the company is bankrupt. “This year alone, six auto parts
companies have closed down and been re-opened by the same owners as
“cooperatives”, as a way to break the contracts with the
workers”. He also pledged support for Vivex workers and warned
MMC not to take similar measures against its own workers.
rejected the claims that the company is bankrupt. “This year alone, six
auto parts companies have closed down and been re-opened by the same
owners as “cooperatives”, as a way to break the contracts with the
workers”.
Sintravivex
leader Jean Sabino explained that the workers are “demanding
the intervention of the state, so that we can continue producing
normally, but under workers’ control.”
On
November 26, the regional coordinator of the Ministry of Labour Alí
Velez, attempted to gain access to the plant together with
representatives from the company, in order to hold a mediation
meeting. But the workers refused to allow them access and or hold any
meetings. Jose Angel Santoyo, one of the workers involved in
the take-over explained that: “we refused them entry, because
we do not trust Velez, we know he is on the company’s side, and
it wouldn’t be the first time that he opens a mediation meeting
and then abandons it”. He insisted that they would only talk
directly to the Minister of Labour, Roberto Hernandez.
On Monday,
December 1, the workers marched to the regional assembly, where they
were met by a delegation and invited to address the whole of the
regional legislative council on Thursday, November 4. “We have
handed in a detailed report for president Chavez” explained a representative of the workers, Jose Angel Hall, “explaining all
the abuses of the owners, who participated in the conspiracy at the
time of the oil lock out and continue to conspire against the workers
now”.
During the
demonstration, union general secretary Jean Carlos Sabino mentioned
Chavez’s statement to the effect that “companies that
break workers’ rights or do not pay them, should be
expropriated”, and asked the national government to act
immediately. He added that the conflict was no longer merely about
labour issues and that the workers have “decided to go beyond
that: we are demanding the expropriation of the company, that it
should be nationalised and run under workers’ control”.
Under the
excuse of “guaranteeing the right to work” of office
workers and managerial staff, the company had applied for a court
order to allow them to enter the factory. But on Wednesday, 3rd,
Vivex workers prevented court employees and police from entering the
plant and breaking the pad-locks.
Turmoil in the car industry
The
situation in the whole of the car industry is one of turmoil. Last
Wednesday, workers at OCI Metalmecánica, in Valencia,
Carabobo, also stopped work for half a day in protest at the
company’s unilateral breaking of contract agreements. Gustavo
Martínez, general secretary of the Sutrafauto union at this
plant which makes bodies and fuel tanks mainly for Chrysler, declared
that the company had not paid utilidades on November 20, as it
was supposed to do. He warned that, unless utilidades were
paid by Monday, December 1st, the workers would paralyse
production.
the the company paid what they agreed to, the union would declare a
strike.
Workers at
the Toyota plant in Cumaná, Sucre, also protested against the
unilateral decision of the company to send the worker of one of the
shifts to early, unpaid, holidays. Argenis Vasquez, one of the leaders
of the union Sintratoyota, argued that the measure had nothing to
do with the problems at Vivex, as the company claimed, but rather
with overproduction: “the parking lot of the factory is full of
assembled cars and the company is attempting to reduce stock and make
the workers pay”. Vasquez also explained that the plant manager
had prevented the trade union adviser from entering the factory
without giving any reason. “We cannot allow this to happen”,
he said. In the end, Toyota agreed not to bring the holidays forward.
At the
Ford plant in Valencia, the workers are also protesting against the fact that
the company is breaking the collective agreement by not allowing
workers to add their free days to their holidays. Sintraford union
representative Juan Aguilar declared on December 3rd that, unless the issue was resolved immediately, they would declare a
strike.
The
conflicts in the car industry in Venezuela take place against the
background of the “Plan Venezuela Movil”, an agreement between
the government and the auto companies that was introduced in June 2005.
The
aim of the plan was to develop the Venezuelan car industry (which is
mainly based in assembling parts produced elsewhere), to allow
consumers access to purchase cars at a reasonable price and with
good financing terms and thus create additional jobs for workers. The
plan consisted in tax exemptions in the sale of cars and tax exmptions
for those companies that committed themselves to increasing the
percentage of
nationally produced parts for certain models covered by the plan.
Venezuela
Movil has actually been a complete disaster, as the trade union
representatives have explained. Despite the increased demand for cars
in Venezuela, the companies have consistently refused to invest in
additional capacity. Only about 10% of the cars sold in
Venezuela in 2007 were made in Venezuela, the rest were imported or a
majority of components for them had been imported. Trade union
leaders in the sector also denounced that despite receiving some
600,000 BsF in tax breaks the companies are constantly breaking
collective bargaining agreements.
Eduardo
Samán, of the tax revenue service SENIAT, has on a number of
occasions denounced examples of the companies flouting the terms of
the Venezuela Movil agreement by selling cars at higher prices, and
is on the record saying that “only by incorporating workers’
representatives to control the accounts” can this be solved.
This shows
the parasitical nature of capitalism. As UNT leader Ruben Linares
pointed out, a plan to renew the vehicles used for public transport
could generate 35,000 new jobs in the sector.
Failure
of reformist policies
Plan
Venezuela Movil was one flagship projects of the reformists in Chávez
government, promoting the idea that a mixed economy with a certain
level of state intervention was the way forward. Collaboration with
private capitalists to attempt to reactivate the economy, create
jobs, etc has been tried … and has quite clearly failed. It
is now time to move towards the nationalisation of the whole of the
car industry, to put it under democratic workers’ control in
order to supply cars to the market and also to solve the serious
problems of public transport in the country. And what applies to the
car industry could be said for the rest of privately owned sectors of
the Venezuelan economy.
those factories where there are problems with payment of wages and
benefits. The workers of Vivex have taken up the appeal. Photo by
Inmigrante a media jornada on flickr.
For months
the workers in the industry have been organising national meetings to
coordinate their actions, including a very important gathering of 600 workers in June last year,
which was addressed by Alan Woods from the
International Marxist Tendency, among others. Alan Woods
stressed the role of the workers’ initiative in the struggle
for socialism: “Here in Venezuela, far too many people are
looking to the top waiting for president Chávez to solve their
problems… it is the people and the workers who have to push the
revolution forward from below, through the taking over and occupation
of factories in order to expropriate the capitalists”, he said.
Now the
workers at Vivex have taken the first step, forced by the
provocations of the employers. For their struggle to be successful,
it needs to spread to the other car plants, where conditions are
ripe. The workers must also frame their conflict, as they are
correctly doing, not merely as a trade union conflict for wages and
conditions, which it is, but also as part of the struggle between
revolution and counter-revolution. In this way they can get the
support of the whole of the population, as well as that of the
working class as a whole.
President
Chavez appealed on Monday to the workers to take over those factories where there are problems
with payment of wages and benefits. The workers of Vivex have taken
up the appeal. Now the national government must intervene in a bold
manner and nationalise the plant under workers’ control.
President
Chávez has now launched a campaign to amend the constitution
to allow him to stand for a further term of office. This is another
important battle, but one that can only be won by moving decisively
towards socialism.
Messages
of solidarity to the Vivex workers can be sent to:
Freteco:
\n [email protected]
Sindicato
Nueva Generación, MMC:
\n [email protected]