Colombian Coke Workers back in Ireland

by James Tue Oct 12, 2004 13:52

It is unfortunate that the Sinaltrainal leader is reported on Indymedia as placing the International Union of Foodworkers (IUF) on the same plain as Coca Cola management. Anyone who knows anything about the IUF knows that this is, quite frankly, nonsense.

It may be that he is misreported – as can quite often happen in these forms of free flowing Internet debates. If he is accurately reported it is unfortunate because it cuts off supporters of trade union rights who may also support the boycott from going to www.iuf.org to see what the IUF does to defend trade union rights around the world. A difference over the boycott tactic does not equal support for attacks on trade unionists. The debate will descend in name calling if this type of allegation starts doing the rounds again.

by Lasc - lasc Wed Oct 13, 2004 14:30

As the person who cid the interview with Javier Correa what he said was that some trade unionists (IUF in particular) had no ideological disagreement with Coca Cola. The report on Indymedia is therefore accurate.

It is not name calling point out that coca cola have hired Jack Otero a former executive member of the AFL-CIO the largest union federation in the US to runs its anti boycott campaign.

The differences with teh IUF are not tactical. The IUF does not accept that Coke has a case to answer (publicly, though one internal document does mention one case that MIGHT have some merits to it).

Please go check this on their site and read their communiques carefully. We have been down this road before and we do't intend wasting energy correcting misperceptions of the IUF.

perhaps you could come to the meeting and challenge Sinaltrainal on the issue.

by James Wed Oct 13, 2004 15:26

I have no problem with the comment on Coke hiring in a former union official in the states. If you want to attack the bosses, fine by me.

I have a problem with the IUF comment. It is still nonsense. It is part of a generalised attack with no specific information. Who is he talking about, what comment(s), etc. Despite the claim above, this was never clarified, apart form when the IUF pointed out glaring errors about oppression of Coca Cola workers in Iran, where there is no Coke plant. The only criteria appear to be: support the boycott or we will call you a friend of the bosses.

All the evidence suggests that the IUF fights for the rights of foodworkers and accurately reflects the views of the vast majority of Coca Cola workers in Latin America and the rest of the world who are against the boycott tactic. This includes those in other unions in Coca Cola in Colombia. See www.iuf.org. The IUF fight the bosses everywhere, try and get a common agreement on rights for those working for Coca Cola bottlers – except for Colombia? Does that make sense to anyone?

Being against a particular tactic does not make a trade unionist or a worker a supporter of the bosses. That is clearly nonsense, but it is implied in the statement above and has been amplified into a sectarian harangue in the past. Maybe all that is starting again. Though it is encouraging that the bona fides of Coca Cola workers in Ireland are accepted, through the agreement to meet them to discuss the situation and to see if common action is possible (in the absence of agreement on the boycott campaign).

By the way, how come Sinaltrainal still produce Coca Cola in the factories in Colombia? There does not seem to be a boycott there. Granted they are a minority in the workforce, but how come they do not argue for a boycott of production there – the usual way in which workers take action. It would certainly make more sense to the Irish Coca Cola workers if they did.

by Lasc - Lasc Wed Oct 13, 2004 21:56

The reference to Iran is historic. It talks about the situation before the revolution when Coca Cola enjoyed good relations with the Shah. So much so that Coke was one of the first companies to be nationalised and Iran now produces its own Cola drink.

As for Colombia the boycott also exists there. it is a consumer boycott there as everywhere else.

james, you seem to a pen name for NM again. Judging by style and smart alec content.

by James Wed Oct 13, 2004 23:38

The comment on SIPTU is wrong too. What shares in Coke? Why do you assume that SIPTU have any? Is this another example of: anyone who disagrees with us on the boycott has “no ideological disagreement with Coca Cola”.

In relation to that phrase (from Mr or Ms LASC above), I have to ask: is there something lost in translation? What exactly is that comment supposed to mean: “ideological disagreement”? Why not go up to the Coca Cola workers and tell them: “you are in ideological agreement with Coca Cola”. Inform them that they will not be accepted as honest-to-goodness members of the working class until they work out their “Ideological” disagreements with their bosses. You might get a few funny looks before they decide to ignore you as a harmless enough loon and go on their way.

The on-the-surface inoffensive looking motion at the SIPTU regional conference was defeated because it was exposed as a cover for the boycott campaign, and the references to it here from supporters of the boycott demonstrate that to be the case. The Coca Cola workers called for an ethical investment policy that would affect investments in all multinationals. They also called for justice for Colombian workers and detailed their activity on this issue. The Education Branch, who proposed the motion, received an education. Given that the majority of the 4,000 trade unionists who have been murdered in Colombia have been public sector workers and a huge number of them teachers, I wonder when Irish educators and radical students will start calling for a permanent boycott of classes in a gesture of solidarity. Perhaps telling ordinary production workers what to do is a more satisfying way of passing the time. Perhaps they are in need of “ideological” re-education.

That being the case, the whole of Indymedia has been overtaken by the concerns of one trade union with one position and the attacks on thousands of trade unionists in Colombia ignored (never mind the attitudes of other unions in Coke in Colombia). The Role of state forces that run the right wing death squads has been effectively whitewashed in a crusade against one multinational corporation. This gigantic international flop is only kept going because of the iconography of Coca Cola as a negative talisman for US capitalism and US hegemony.

But while radicals fight a phantom, the state apparatus and its henchmen and allies in all walks of the economy and society get away with murder.

(I suppose the comment on Iran under the Shah is as “historic” (that’s a new one) as the photograph from Kent State in 1968 above, when National Guardsmen shot down and killed four anti-Vietnam protesters at Kent State university: an event now being blamed on, you guessed it, Coca Cola!)

by pc Thu Oct 14, 2004 03:31

A group of activists at New York University turned the school's many Coke vending machines into mock crime scenes to protest Coke's human rights abuses in Columbia bottling plants and raise student awareness about the issue.

by Observer Thu Oct 14, 2004 10:59

"The on-the-surface inoffensive looking motion at the SIPTU regional conference was defeated because it was exposed as a cover for the boycott campaign, and the references to it here from supporters of the boycott demonstrate that to be the case."

Wouldn't have anything to do with with branch members being mandated to vote against it, on the threat of expulsion? Course it wouldn't.
Democracy, me arse!!

by James Thu Oct 14, 2004 12:22

Apologies, the Kent State killings occurred on May 4 1970, not 1968. The picture above is of Jeffrey Millar, one of the four victims of the National Guardsmen, the state militia. However, I was correct in saying they were not killed by Coca Cola. And no, I don’t know if the Governor of Kent state was friendly with any Coca Cola CEOs or if he participated in suppressing the wages of Coca Cola workers.

Observer:
Observer starts the kind of rubbish comment that plagued this discussion last year. He writes concerning the way delegates voted at the SIPTU regional conference: “Wouldn't have anything to do with with [sic] branch members being mandated to vote against it, on the threat of expulsion? Course it wouldn't. Democracy, me arse!!”

It is now incumbent on supporters of the boycott to step in and to begin to distance themselves from this type of rubbish statement. It gives a completely false picture of life within a trade union. Criticise the bureaucracy fine, but this is just pandering to right wing and, dare I suggest it, petty bourgeois conceptions of trade union democracy. After the vote, which those opposing the motion fought openly and clearly, everyone said how much they enjoyed the debate and its ppolitical clarity. The suggestion of coercion is patent nonsense and an insult to all the delegates.

by Curious Thu Oct 14, 2004 12:37

"The suggestion of coercion is patent nonsense and an insult to all the delegates."

So you are saying that no delegates were mandated by their branch on what way to vote on this motion?
Can a branch be mandated in what way to vote for a regional conference?

by Chekov Thu Oct 14, 2004 12:41

Once again we have a lot of criticism from SIPTU officials (which I assume you are). Fair enough. But what we don't have is any, and I mean any, suggestions for alternative ways to show support to the Colombian workers. What are you proposing? Because without this, you are just doing the boss's job.

by James Thu Oct 14, 2004 13:07

The Irish Coca Cola workers were the first to bring this matter up within the European Works Council, before the boycott call started. They have put it on the agenda again.

They protested at the visit of the Colombian Vice President to Leinster House. They raised with him state collusion with, and direction of, death squads. No Boycotters there, so they probably don’t know this.

They have had, alongside the ICTU, meetings with Coke management pressing them to resolve the issue with Sinaltrainal.

They organised a public meeting on the issue. Your South America correspondent, the LASC spokesperson, managed to find not much positive to say about it in his ‘report’.

They are participating in a joint Irish-British trade union delegation to Colombia, where they will meet all the parties and will assess the situation first hand.

A lot more could be done if the grandstanding stopped and a sincere attempt to find a common way forward in opposition to the death squads in Colombia was engaged in. The strategy of organised boycott based on the views of one trade union that has suffered repression is an obstacle. It is a question of whether campaigners can come to a mature consideration of the gains that could be won by dropping the boycott and unifying in a joint campaign. Singing from the same hymn sheet is sometimes the best way of presenting a united front of opposition to injustice. All the other differences that people and groups have could be subordinated to a common goal for a limited period in the context of winning an agreed strategy. It might be ‘powerful’, more so than what we have now at any rate.

I am not a SIPTU official.

by pc Thu Oct 14, 2004 13:55

there was pieace in the info today about how the former? su president is not going to a honourary degree presentation of the former head of coke because of reports of "bullying" in coca cola plants...

as usual can't get direct link to it

by Gonzo Thu Oct 14, 2004 19:17 reclaim98 at hotmail dot com

...this makes Sinn Fein's bid to open the European Social Forum in London this weekend look totally hypocritical.

"Sinn Fein Assembly member and Councillor Michael Ferguson said that if a rescue package for the [Lisburn] plant could not be found, he would be urging Coca-Cola to site their new Irish headquarters “as close as possible” to Lambeg."


Sources:

http://www.sluggerotoole.com/archives/2004/09/republican_soli.php

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/business/story.jsp?story=566640

http://www.anphoblacht.com/news/search?q=coca+cola

by James Fri Oct 15, 2004 02:50

What is Gonzo saying, that Coca Cola plants should be shut down and the workers thrown out of jobs? Logically, that should be the case in Colombia too. I suspect that Gonzo might have a problem with Sinaltrainal on that one, never mind Irish Coca Cola workers.

Someday, someone in or around Indymedia will get their head around this one.

Workers in Ireland and Columbia have a right to their jobs, to live and work without fear or the threat of violence, poverty, misery or unemployment. As socialists, as trade unionists, or just as democrats, it is our job to defend and to vindicate that right. It is the job of Columbian workers to stand up for their rights and to show solidarity one with the other. It is the job of Irish workers to show solidarity with their Columbian brothers and sisters. It is not the job of Columbian workers to tell Irish Workers how to do that job in Ireland, anymore than it is the job of Irish workers to tell Columbian workers how best to defend themselves in Columbia. Defending Columbian Coca Cola workers means also defending Irish Coca Cola workers.

Any solidarity campaigner who thinks it a good thing that Coca Cola plants should shut down is living in cloud cuckoo land. A strategy that sees the struggle of workers in lesser developed countries as on a higher political plane than those in countries with a higher standard of living used to be called ‘third worldism’. Gonzo has just fallen into one of the essential traps of that creed. It is one that is implicit in the boycott strategy. Irish workers jobs are of less value politically than those of Columbian workers – that is the essential message being preached. It means that unity between Coca Cola workers and a defence of the rights and jobs of all coca Cola workers is secondary to defending the rights and jobs only of workers in Coca Cola in Columbia – despite the fact that the strategy being followed is a strategy favoured by a minority of Coca Cola workers in Columbia.

Any public representative who is defending the rights of workers to their jobs is to be commended.

Without a job a worker and his/her family is thinking only of the immediate day-to-day needs of the situation. They become isolated and increasingly destitute individualists. With a job, workers are in a position to collectively organise a defence of their immediate interests and those of their fellow and sister workers in Ireland and/or in Columbia.

One union in Columbia has gone on an ultra-left path internationally in defence of its members’ interests locally, because of the extreme repression it has faced. In a desire to show solidarity with a country facing an onslaught from US imperialism and its local agents, anti-globalisation campaigners have adopted this ultra-leftism unthinkingly.

It is time to think. Maybe Gonzo's message will help.

by James Fri Oct 15, 2004 10:45

1. Although it is frequently 'petty' the reference a few comments up should be to 'petit' bourgeois thinking.

2. The reference earlier to the Governor of Kent State should of course refer to the Governor of Ohio, in which Kent State University is situated, where the National Guard killed four anti-Vietnam War student demonstrators in 1970 – the poster (literally, the picture) above suggests that they were killed by Coca Cola. Artistic license is one thing but I assume that we are supposed to base our observations on fact, not fiction.

by Petit pois Fri Oct 15, 2004 12:07

Tell me James, if you define someone who questions the democracy of the union as petit bourgeois, what are you?
A 'professional revolutionary'? Or a petty bureaucrat perhaps?

by James Fri Oct 15, 2004 13:13

I did not allege what you suggest, read more carefully. There was no lack of democracy in the debate. The debate was an exercise in democracy. In that sense the comment I complained of certainly "questions.. democracy".

The comment was also an insult to SIPTU delegates, all of them. It was a typical comment which substitutes stupid slander for a discussion that will take the discussion forward. It destroyed the discussion last year. Since it is all on the pro-boycott side, that side needs to distance itself from it. No sign as yet.

by Petit pois Fri Oct 15, 2004 13:44

The contribution which you want people to distance themselves from didn't say anything about the democracy of the debate. What they questioned was the democracy of the vote on the motion.
I notice you didn't answer curious!

by James Fri Oct 15, 2004 14:36

What lack of "democracy on the vote"? This is just splitting hairs and going off at a tangent. Some people think democracy is served by mandating delegates after a discussion at branch or section level. Some think it is served by sending un-mandated delegates.

Either way (and I don't know which method was used at the SIPTU regional conference – it is irrelevant), the comment, including the reference to his/her posterior, was typical of the dismissive and arrogant and middle class contempt for discussion and debate among elected delegates at a trade union conference. The stuff about threats and expulsion is really not worthy of comment. As I say, it is typical of a certain mindset that the boycott tactic, and the way it has been conducted here, encourages.

If there was a problem with democracy, we would have heard about it by now. The comment was from someone desperate to make a point, throwing a pebble into the pond in order to see the splash. If boycott supporters are happy with this method of conducting debate that is their business. It does not impress members of SUPTU (but what do they know, only being workers?).

by amanda allaway - nipsa member Tue Oct 19, 2004 22:15

Well done to LASC and those who supported them in organising the event last night at which Edgar Paez delivered a most compelling case for the boycott. I hope that anyone who was there who did not support the boycott has been convinced of the validity of Sinaltrainal's position. I understand that even the IUF who opposed the boycott and attempted to undermine the claims made in relation to Coke's involvement have now backtracked - perhaps someone can confirm that IUF have shifted their position as I wonder what effect this might have on SIPTU - particularly in light of the fact that Coke are now seeking to close down plants in Ireland. Will SIPTU now be calling for solidarity when they seem reluctant to give it to their colleagues in colombia - it appears from last nights meeting that many SIPTU members are very concerned about the position in relation to the boycott.

by Matt Fri Oct 29, 2004 18:53

The IUF seems to have a long history of sectarian anti-communism. See the following:

Introduction by the General Secretary to the
Report on Activities to the 23rd IUF Congress,
Geneva, April 15 - 18, 1997
Cuba is, at this point, a political irrelevancy. We find its regime repellent, but we must remain open to the needs of the Cuban workers to deal with the problems of market Stalinism on that small island. Our last congress already declared that the politically senseless and vindictive blockade imposed by the United States should be lifted. Cuba is in no way a national security threat to the United States. If there is any good we can do in strengthening the resolve and the ability of the Cuban unions to defend their members’ interests it is our duty not to ignore this opportunity.

Re: Philippines
Joe Tampinco, a former officer of the National Sugar Workers Federation/KMU who had left the NFSW and had helped establish a rival union, was assassinated in July 1988. Dan Gallin, Secretary General of the IUF, believing the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) was behind the assasination, charged the NFSW with "moral complicity" in the killing. He justified this by claiming that since the NFSW was controlled by the CPP, it shared the burden of the assassination. (However, Gallin admitted to International Labour Reports in a February 1989 interview that he did not even have substantial circumstantial evidence to support either his claim of CPP control over the NFSW or of the NFSW's "moral complicity" for the killing.)
In response to the IUF attack, which was the latest in a string of controversial issues, three of the four KMU-affiliated unions that were also affiliated with the IUF withdrew from the IUF, claiming that the IUF had politically intervened in their internal affairs, discriminated against them and tried to split their organizations. For details, see Scipes, n.d.

Re: South Africa
Negative, i.e. denunciatory, passages or items have abounded in the debates about labour internationalism and socialism during the last few years. Here is one from a letter by Dan Gallin, General Secretary of the International Union of Food and Allied Workers (IUF), criticising the South African Congress of Trade Unions (The ANC's traditional union ally from the 1950s to the 1980s):
“SACTU in exile represented never more than a small clique of parasites living off Soviet subventions who put more energy into defending their sectarian turf...than into fighting apartheid.” (Vol. 16, No. 2, 1991:5).

by Colombia Solidarity Campaign Tue Nov 09, 2004 15:02

SINALTRAINAL represents the majority of unionised workers, more than all of the other unions combined. While there are a couple of unions (most notably the one which took over at the Carepa plant after SINALTRAINAL was wiped out by the paramilitaries there) which, for their own reasons, are not in support of the campaign against Coca-Cola, SINALTRAINAL has earned the active support of the largest union federation in Colombia, the CUT (Unitary Workers Federation) as well as the World Social Forum.