•  HOME 
  •  ARCHIVES 
  •  BOOKS 
  •  PDF ARCHIVE 
  •  WWP 
  •  SUBSCRIBE 
  •  DONATE 
  •  MUNDOOBRERO.ORG
  • Loading


Follow workers.org on
Twitter Facebook iGoogle




Millions come out for May Day

Published May 4, 2005 5:25 PM

Throughout Latin America the commemoration of May Day was once again a reminder that the majority of the peoples south of the Rio Grande are not willing to allow the United States to impose so-called “free trade” agreements on them. From Mexico to Argentina, unions and social organizations mobilized, honoring the legacy of the Chicago heroes of 1886 while bringing into focus the local issues particular to each country—all of them voicing specific demands on their own governments.

Many of the demonstrations were products of unified coalitions of labor unions and social and popular movements. How ever, in Nicaragua and Puerto Rico, different rallies were held by opposing groups, reflecting deep diverging political ideologies and representing positions of adherence to or rejection of the United States and its neoliberal imperialist policies.


Cuba

This year’s May Day came on the heels of the controversial trip of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to several Latin American countries. Her trip has been viewed in the region as an attempt by the Bush administration to rally forces for a Latin American “coalition of the willing” against democratically elected Vene zuelan President Hugo Chávez.

But Rice had to tone down her hostile pronouncements against Chávez because, with the exception of Colombia, where President Álvaro Uribe Vélez is a U.S. puppet and its closest ally in South America, Latin American leaders rejected her demands for the isolation of Venezuela—politely but firmly.


Bolivia

In Brazil, the first country visited, Rice tried to curry favor by calling it “a remarkable and emerging power in the region.” However, when she used the occasion to urge Venezuela to “live up to the democratic principles in the charter of the Organization of American States,” Celso Amorim, the Brazilian foreign minister, reportedly answered that Brazil will “always, of course, observe the sovereignty of Venezuela,” and that “in any society, if problems exist, they should be solved by the people of the country itself.”

Rice’s visit seems to have fueled more animosity, if this is possible, against Washington’s attempt to totally dominate the continent, which was palpable in the May Day events.


Brazil

The rallies in Cuba, Venezuela and Colom bia had the highest turnout in years, with a combined total of more than 5 million people.

In Cuba, according to Prensa Latina, 1.3 million people gathered in historic Revolu tion Square. Presided over by Commander-in-Chief Fidel Castro, the gathering was also attended by many union representatives from around the world who had been part of the Fourth Hemispheric Conference against the Free Trade Area of the Americas, held recently in Havana. A total of 60 percent of Cuba’s population attended simultaneous rallies held throughout the island.


Colombia

The main topic there was Washington’s anti-Cuba policy, particularly the outrageous act of the imperialists in allowing Luis Posada Carriles to recently enter the United States. The case of Posada Carriles exposes the hypocrisy and double talk in Washington’s “anti-terrorism” rhetoric.

Posada Carriles was found guilty of participating in the bombing of a Cubana airliner in 1976 that killed 73 people. He was jailed in Venezuela—long before Hugo Chávez became president—but escaped after eight years with the help of a right-wing Cuban American connected to the CIA, Jorge Mas Canosa.

Posada Carriles was also involved in the “Iran-Contra” scandal, importing large quantities of cocaine to the U.S., and has been linked to a recent string of bombings in Cuba.

Bolivarian revolution
gaining momentum

Shortly before May Day, Chávez had visited Cuba and signed new agreements within the framework of ALBA—the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas—a thorough economic, cultural and social development program between both countries initiated last December.


Costa Rica

This cooperation between Cuba and Venezuela is giving enormous strength to the powerful anti-imperialist forces developing throughout Latin America.

Chávez returned home from Cuba for a May Day rally that highlighted the role of the Venezuelan workers in the Bolivarian Revolution. Addressing more than a million people, Chávez spoke at length about the advances of the revolution and the tasks ahead in constructing what is called “Bolivarian socialism.” But he also caution ed the masses to be vigilant about attempts by the U.S. to destroy the revolution.

Recent developments that challenge capitalist property relations and modes of production in Venezuela were visible in slogans that workers chanted or wrote on banners: “Co-management is revolution,” “Venezuelan workers are building Boli varian socialism,” “Co-management and production: All power to the workers.”


Honduras

The most progressive Venezuelan workers are rapidly pushing forward the development of workers’ collectives to take control of companies, with the help of the state, in order to benefit the people.

Starting with Venepal, a company that was taken over and run by the workers after its owners filed for bankruptcy, the government has been following the workers’ lead. Now this paper industry is being run by the workers and the state through co-management and has been renamed Invepal. It is a model that is spreading like wildfire throughout the country.


Mexico

The question being raised now is how to initiate co-management in private firms. Because the workers have raised it through the National Workers Union (UNT), the largest and most progressive workers’ confederation that was formed a year ago, it will be debated in the National Assembly.

Repression can’t stop Colombia’s May Day

In neighboring Colombia, the treatment of the workers by the government is a different story. Nine out of 10 union leaders killed in the world in recent years have been Colombians. Their struggle is not for co-management but for sheer survival.


Nicaragua

President Uribe, undoubtedly urged on by the U.S., introduced a so-called Patriot Plan aimed at destroying unions and the vigorous social movements that oppose his policies of selling out the country’s resources to transnational corporations. This repression poses a grave danger to Afro-Colombians, the Indigenous, peasants, workers and human rights defenders.

The Consulting Group for Human Rights and Displacement (CODHES) said in a recent report entitled “The Ostrich Policy” that 778 people were displaced every day and 11 killed every 24 hours during the first quarter of this year. The report identifies the Patriot Plan as the principal cause of the displacements.


Uruguay

Sinaltrainal, the union representing Coca-Cola bottling plant workers, lost nine of its members last year at the hands of paramilitaries in the service of the soft-drink giant. These crimes continue with impunity with the complicity of both the Colombian and U.S. governments. Yet the struggle continues and gets stronger, despite the repression, massacres, displace ments and selective assassinations.

Sinaltrainal struggles not only for its members, to save their lives, but for a just and democratic Colombia. Unions are joining with other unarmed civilian organizations to bring changes for the benefit of the masses. The people in Colombia are waging the most courageous struggle in the continent.


Venezuela

And this May Day, according to Fabio Arias, vice-president of the United Workers Center (CUT), was the largest ever in Colombia, with the participation of 2 million people—100,000 in Bogotá alone.

In Brazil, where the Landless Move ment MST had initiated an 11,000-strong march from Pernambuco to Brasilia demanding land reform on May 1, more than 1 million attended a May Day march in Sao Paulo, Brazil’s capital.

In Mexico, where, according to the Electrical, Social Security and Telephone workers’ unions, half of the population survive on less than $7 a day and nine out of 10 peasants do not receive even minimum wage, tens of thousands demonstrated against President Vicente Fox, accusing him of being a “lackey of the United States and the World Bank.”

In Ecuador, where the masses last month forced out President Lucio Gutiér rez, leaving his vice president, Alfredo Palacio, in charge, 10,000 workers demo nstrated, chanting “Palacio out, Congress out, everybody out.” They also carried giant banners against the Free Trade agreement.

Demonstrations were held in almost every country of South and Central Amer ica and the Caribbean, including Argen tina, Chile, Uruguay, Nicaragua—where protests have been held recently against the neoliberal government of Enrique Bolaños—and Puerto Rico. The progressive sector of the unions in this island colony of Washington joined in solidarity with organizations waging a struggle against the privatization of beaches by U.S. corporations.