Guaynabo, Puerto Rico
(for Green Left Weekly, Australia)
The entire labor movement of Puerto Rico has come out in support of the telephone workers in a call for a national strike against the privatization of the Puerto Rico Telephone Company in this Island colony of the United States. The general strike is set to begin on July 7 at dawn.
On June 18, 6,000 workers in the two unions of the PRTC went out on strike against the government proposal to sell the state-owned telephone company to telecommunications giant GTE Corporation, which owns the telephone company in the neighboring Dominican Republic.
The reaction of conservative governor Pedro Rosselló was to call out the riot police and beat up strikers who were picketing to prevent strikebreakers from entering telecommunications facilities all over the Island. When the images of police beating up strikers were broadcast over television, there was a massive reaction on the part of other unions and the public in general.
Thousands flocked to the picket lines to strengthen the strike. University students went en masse to the facilities in Río Piedras and Guaynabo. Motorists passing by the facilities in the San Juan metropolitan area donated over $100,000 for the strike fund in the first ten days of the strike. The powerful Electrical Workers Union (UTIER) went on a three day stoppage. The aqueduct and water authority workers went out for 24 hours, while the Teamsters paralyzed the ports. Local polls show that the public is opposed to the privatization of the phone company by a better than two to one margin.
The president of the Puerto Rico Bar Association, Fermín Arraíza, and the President of the Puerto Rican Commission on Civil Rights, Luis Aulet, have expressed themselves in the press against the "excessive use of force" on the part of the police of Puerto Rico. The Bar Association has posted lawyers on the picket lines as observers to guarantee that the police do not violate people's constitutional rights. Doctors are volunteering their services to treat wounded strikers.
Religious groups have shown up on the picket lines to call for an end to police violence. During hours of high attendance at noon and on weekends, when the crowds supporting the pickets number in the thousands, the police tone down their aggressive behavior and the picket lines become a people's festival with free performances by local artists.
Over five thousand delegates from trade unions and community organizations voted on Sunday, June 28 to approve a national strike of all workers in Puerto Rico against the privatization of the PRTC. The assembly of the Comité Amplio de Organizaciones Sindicales, Cívicas, Religiosas y Culturales (CAOS- Greater Committee of Labor Organizations ) which took place in the town of Carolina, east of the capital city of San Juan, brought together delegates from more than 60 unions in Puerto Rico, including the main public sector unions which are in the forefront of the struggle against privatization.
The CAOS is led by the official union movement but also includes the participation of delegates, shop stewards and rank and file workers, students -- all the progressive social forces in support of the strike. At Sunday’s meeting fifty percent (50%) of the delegates were women, and the official spokesperson for CAOS is Annie Cruz, head of the Independent Brotherhood of Telephone Employees, one of the two telephone worker’s unions on strike.
Faced with this eruption of rank and file militancy, union leaders asked for sufficient time to consult their organizations before setting a date for the strike.
On Monday, June 29, the Executive Committee of the Greater Committee of Labor Organizations (CAOS) set the date of the strike, which will begin on Tuesday, July 7, 1998 at 6:00 a.m. Not date was set for an end to the strike. The unions will evaluate the progress of the strike day by day. Response to the Ravages of neoliberalism: "Puerto Rico no se vende" The surprising level of support for the phone workers is an indication of the accumulated effect of neoliberal policies of privatization. Workers who can expect layoffs and consumers who can expect higher prices for basic services are opposed to privatization. The neoliberal program or privatizing absolutely everything may be good for private capital. It is, however, detrimental to the average worker and consumer. Privatization has been advancing in education with a recent bill which takes money from public higher education in favor of private universities, in health care, where many hospitals and clinics are being privatized, and in many other government agencies through subcontracting.
Throughout the Island picket lines have been set up at all PRTC offices. Workers and supporters have been in the streets with the Puerto Rican flag, which has become the symbol of the strike. The main slogan which has caught on in this Spanish speaking U.S. colony is "Puerto Rico no se vende." The slogan expresses a combination of anti-market and anti-imperialist feelings among the population: Rendered into English, the slogan means both "Puerto Rico is not for sale" and "Puerto Rico does not sell out."
This historic working class struggle has exploded as the 100th anniversary of the U.S. invasion and colonization of Puerto Rico is approaching. On July 25, 1898, U.S. war ships entered Guánica Bay and U.S. troops launched the military takeover of the island during the Spanish American War, in which the United States also seized Cuba and the Philippines from Spain. Puerto Rico has been a U.S. colony since then.
On October 1 of last year, over 100,000 demonstrators converged on San Juan to protest government plans to privatize the PRTC. That mobilization in an island with a total population of three and a half million was the largest demonstration of any kind ever to take place in Puerto Rico.
Contrary to the neoliberal creed, PRTC is an efficient government-owned enterprise. Governor Pedro Rosselló's attempt to privatize would generate funds for the government, which is utilizing state patronage to increase support for the governing party's attempt to request the annexation of Puerto Rico as the 51st state of the United States. .
Consumers who still remember the time when the local phone company was privately owned by International Telephone and Telegraph agree unequivocally that under government ownership the PRTC has provided better and more efficient service than its private predecessor. If the privatization plan is carried out, at least 2,700 workers will loose their jobs in the immediate future, and many more will loose their jobs over the medium term.
The last national strike in Puerto Rico took place in 1934, when 100,000 workers from the sugar plantations went out on strike. Since the 1950s, the sugar industry has been dismantled, and the island has industrialized. Annie Cruz, leader of the Independent Brotherhood of Telephone Workers and spokesperson for the CAOS, says that this time around, at least 300,000 workers will go out.