Santiago
JUNE 14- One of the products in shortest supply in Chile at the moment is toothpaste. It is almost impossible to find it except on the black market. One of the recent labor conflicts in Santiago was caused by the struggle of the workers against this state of affairs.
"GEKA Laboratories" is the company that makes the most popular toothpaste in Chile. The bosses of this company had distinguished themselves by repeatedly failing to live up to contract agreements. Among other things, they did not provide the agreed-upou uniforms. As for wage raises, they violated agreements and in a discriminatory fashion raised only those of their informers and stooges.
But the bosses of this company were not satisfied with exploiting their own workers. They attempted to suck blood from the people as a whole. They urged their workers to stage a public demonstration in the streets clamoring for an increase in the price of toothpaste! This was not a utopian hope on their part, for bosses in various countries have succeeded in getting their workers to take such action in connection with offers of wage increases. This time, however, the GEKA bosses were mistaken. They found themselves up against the highly developed class consciousness of the workers, who told them that to do such a thing would be as crazy as to take to the streets shouting "We want an increase in the price of bread and milk!"
But this was not all the workers did in defense of the interests of the consumer. The workers who made the truck deliveries of toothpaste to the pharmacies agreed to inform the neighbors in the vicinity of each pharmacy of the deliveries.
The boss had had the labels removed from the boxes so the public would not be able to identify the toothpaste. The workers resorted to many different ploys to frustrate the boss's 862
efforts to keep it a secret. They would enter a pharmacy full of customers with the boxes open so people could see what they contained. When they were not allowed to do this, they would "stumble" so that the tubes of toothpaste would be out in the open for everyone to see. On other occasions, they would ask the pharmacist in a loud voice what product was being delivered. Lastly, they would tell the neighbors directly about the arrival of the toothpaste.
Everyone knows that the reason the pharmacists and the bosses were angry about all this is their efforts to send all of the product onto the black market.
The laboratory owners began a campaign against the delivery men. They took them off their jobs and sent them to carry out very boring tasks, generally isolated from the rest of the workers and under the close watch of a supervisor who took it upon himself to make life miserable for them. This kind of repression was first applied to one worker, Roberto Pizarro, and then extended to others. Finally, a supervisor attacked the worker Orlando Ramirez, and when Ramirez complained, he was fired.
This was the last straw for the GEKA workers (most of whom are women), who had already been hit with the imprisonment of two of their compañeras, slandered as having stolen two (!) tubes of toothpaste.
The workers, and some of the whitecollar employees, went on strike. They asked that contracts be observed, that those who had been fired be rehired, and that the all-powerful supervisors be punished. But the demand that stood out most was the following: "We demand an investigation into where our products are sent and the way in which the taxes are paid. ... We demand the immediate formation of bodies that allow the participation of the workers in the distribution of our products and in the acquisition of raw materials."
The complaints of the GEKA workagainst government officials officiale ers should be pointed out. The work inspector Emilio Loyola called María Eugenia Farías, the president of the union, "crazy" for consistently defending the rights of her companeros. The strike manifesto stated: "Our concern as workers has always been to keep a lookout for and to expose the whole gamut of irregularities that have existed, and that exist, in regard to the distribution of our products; we have demonstrated this concern in repeated reports to DIRINCO (Dirección de Industria y Comercio-Industry and Trade Office] and the Oficina de Delitos Tributarios [Office of Tax Violations] without yet seeing any solution to the problem of the undersupply of Odontine paste."
From the very first day of the strike, the GEKA workers received support from the Vicuna Mackena Industrial Cordón. Despite the cordón's organizational weaknesses, it was able to see to it that there were always compañeros from other factories on the scene in the tents set up by the GEKA union in the entrance to the laboratory. This, and the public demonstration carried out by the cordón, served to counteract the provocations of the right and pro-boss elements - stooges who first took over the factory to prevent the workers from occupying it, and who then, after leaving through the windows because of the lack of water, settled down on the facing sidewalk and engaged in provocations against the workers. One night, cars belonging to Patria y Libertad [Fatherland and Freedom, a far-right group] drove past throughout the whole night in an effort to intimidate the workers.
Nevertheless, neither the provocations, nor the maneuvers of the proboss judges, nor the attitude of the CUT [Central Unica de Trabajadores - Workers Central Union] and the Popular Unity governmentleadership of putting a brake on struggles, nor the hunger and cold endured by the workers in the flimsy and simple tents were enough to force the workers, the GEKA production workers, and the few white-collar workers who joined them, to give up.
Although at first the workers demanded only the points already mentioned, when they saw the hostile attitude of the bosses and the results of a deal that was agreed to by the workers in the Vitorino shoe factory, they decided to demand that the plant be transferred to the Social Sector of the economy, that is, to state ownership. At Vitorino, the bosses had just agreed to provide a heaven on earth for the workers so that work could be resumed; yet they ended up firing all but seven of their workers. The GEKA workers saw through the sweet promises finally made by their bosses, and rejected them.
Finally, through DIRINCO the government found itself obliged to requisition the laboratories and name an interventor. The Communist party and its economies minister, Orlando Millas, opposed this "take-over" (which was in reality only a blocking of the gates); yet they were forced to give in by the pressure of the working class and the GEKA workers. In an irony of the class struggle, the workers were led by a rank-and-file CP activist, a twenty-eight-year-old courageous woman who placed the interests of her class above the interests of her party.
The final resolution adopted by the general assembly of the GEKA workers union was:
"1. Bring into operation as soon as possible all bodies of workers participation - an administrative committee, a coordinating committee, production committees, and committees for defense and protection.
"2. Change administrative structures: strict control over planning and distribution; a large percentage of the goods produced must go directly to the people, for the present via the
Store (a people's store
Monserrat planned by the Vicuna Mackena Cordón). In the future, all of the goods that are produced must go directly to the people via people's stores.
"3. End wage and salary discrimination.
"4. Open all the books.
"5. A common dining hall. At present there are four - one each for office workers, professional workers, production workers, and bosses...."
It is clear that the struggle has not ended, not even on the level of this particular factory. A new stage is beginning, one of struggle against the state bureaucracy, of struggle for workers management. In order to wage this struggle, the workers will have to recognize the fraudulent nature of so-called participation.
gency into a state of siege. Such a measure would have set aside many constitutional guarantees for a period of ninety days and given the president the power to order house arrests and search and seizure without warrants.
On July 2, the Chamber of Deputies rejected the petition by a vote of 81 to 52. In response, Allende issued a statement in which he warned that "every citizen should be aware that the nation is on the border of a new civil war, which the Government is pledged to avoid."
On July 1, a government offer was accepted by striking workers at Chile's giant Teniente copper mine, bringing to an end their two-and-a-half-month strike. "The strikers last night agreed to return to their jobs tomorrow after accepting a Government offer of a bonus payment of $225 and a wage increase of $15 a month," reported Reuters July 2. "But they are demanding that sanctions against 60 miners dismissed for occupying a radio station in Rancagua, near the mine 50 miles south of Santiago, be called off.
"The Government has insisted that a commission be set up to try the 60."
The strike cost Chile an estimated $70 million to $100 million in lost production.