NATIONAL STRIKE IN PUERTO RICO

AGAINST PRIVATIZATION OF PHONE COMPANY

For Immediate Release

Tuesday, June 30, 1998

Contact: Rafael Santiago , Federación de Maestros

787-766-1818

The Executive Meeting of the Broad Committee of Trade Union Organizations met on Monday June 29, at 6:00 p.m. to set the date for the beginning of a national strike to oppose the privatization of the Puerto Rico Telephone Company. Over five thousand delegates from trade unions and community organizations had 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- Broad Committee of Trade Union 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. Union leaders asked yesterday for sufficient time to consult their organizations before setting a date for the strike. Today's meeting of the Executive Committee 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.

 The labor movement in Puerto Rico is involved in a major confrontation against the government over the privatization of the Puerto Rico Telephone Company. The state owned corporation is being sold by the administration of governor Pedro Rosselló to a group of investors led by GTE Corporation and the Banco Popular de Puerto Rico.

 The two unions in the Puerto Rico Telephone Company (Independent Union of Telephone Workers UIET, and Independent Brotherhood of Telephone Workers HIETEL).are on strike as of June 18.

 Over the last ten days, the Puerto Rico Police has deployed massive armed power against the pickets in front of the facilities of the Puerto Rico Telephone Company. The president of the Puerto Rico Bar Association (Colegio de Abogados), Fermín Arraíza, and the Presidente of the Puerto Rican Commission on Civil Rights (Comisión de Derechos Civiles), 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 does not violate people's constitutional rights.

Broadcasts of police beating strikers have caused an outpouring of solidarity in favor of the strikers. Unions have collected over $100,000 in donations for the strike fund from a sympathetic public which opposes the privatization of the phone company by a margin of two to one, according to local polls.  

The powerful Electrical Workers Union (UTIER) went on a three day strike last week. The Aqueduct Workers Union (UIA) walked out for 24 hours in support of the workers of the Puerto Rico Telephone Company. The teamsters walked out in the ports. 

Delegates from more than 60 unions from the public and private sectors approved the call for a "national strike" at Sunday's meeting. The starting date of the strike was set on Monday the 29th at 6:00 p.m. by the union leaders of the CAOS.  

The local press has reported widespread sabotage against phone lines and automatic teller machines in offices of the Banco Popular de Puerto Rico.

Annie Cruz, president of one of the telephone workers' unions (HIETEL) and spokesperson for the CAOS, declaredon Sunday at the assembly that "the fiber optic cables have not been able to resist the people's indignation."

In response to recent declarations by the chief of police, Mr. Pedro Toledo, that students, faculty from the University of Puerto Rico, and other "outside agitators" are responsible for the violence in the picket lines, HIETEL president Annie Cruz explained today that the strike of the phone workers has become a national strike against privatization.  

Police Chief Toledo is attempting to isolate the strike by associating it exclusively with pro-independence figures, portraying the strike as the work of "extremists." Toledo has singled out professors Rafael Bernabe and Julio Muriente of the University of Puerto Rico, Jorge Farinacci of the Socialist Front, and Ricardo Santos of the electrical workers as the " agitators" responsible for the strike.  

Today in the Carolina assembly, HIETEL president Cruz thanked the broad sectors of the population which have shown up at the picket lines in support of the telephone workers, defending the lines against strikebreakers and the police, and providing physical and monetary support to the strikers. Students, faculty, members of other unions and the public in general who have provided strike support are not "outsiders," declared Cruz. They are part of a broad popular movement against the takeover of the phone company by a foreign corporation.  

Women have played a critical role on the picket lines, and are in charge of the organization of security at critical sites such as Celulares Telefónica in Río Piedras. 

Last week buttons and stickers in the pickets characterized the telephone workers strike as "la huelga del pueblo" (the people's strike). In Carolina on Sunday , more than five thousand delegates voted for a "national strike" of all workers in Puerto Rico against privatization.  

The struggle of the phone workers has become a line in the sand for the labor movement as a whole. 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.  

The surprising level of support for the phone workers is an indication of the accumulated effect of neoliberal policies of privatization. A coalition of workers who can expect layoffs and consumers who can expect higher prices for basic services is saying, loud and clear, that the neoliberal program or privatizing everything under the sun may be good for private capital, but is bad news for the average worker and consumer.  

The main slogan which has caught on expresses a combination of broad 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."

There has been a broad based movement in Puerto Rico against the privatization of the Puerto Rico Telephone Company. On October 1 of last year, over 100,000 demonstrators converged on San Juan to protest government plans to privatize the PRTC. That mobilization was the largest demonstration of any kind ever to take place in Puerto Rico.

 The PRTC is an efficient government owned enterprise and governor Pedro Rosselló's attempt to privatize it is due to an abstract commitment to a neoliberal economic program, not to a reality of inefficiency of government enterprise, as has been claimed.  

In fact, 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.