Communist Solidarity with Garment Workers Occupying Factory here ♦ Women Workers in Struggle Appreciate Communist Solidarity here ♦ Workers Need Revolution, Not Elections here ♦
“Florenzi Accuses the Salvadoran State as a Violator of Human Rights” “Women Organized in Resistance” “On Hunger Strike”
Communist Solidarity with Garment Workers Occupying Factory
EL SALVADOR, January 20— A group of 210 workers at the Florenzi factory in San Salvador, mostly women, were fired early last year, when the coronavirus crisis began. They weren’t paid their severance pay or pending wages. In response, 113 workers occupied the facilities. The boss has fled, backed by the government and the police, and doesn’t show his face to the workers.
The workers stayed in the factory where they have been protesting and have now gone on a hunger strike. This shows clearly that capitalism subjects workers to hunger and poverty.
Last weekend, comrades from various sectors of the International Communist Workers’ Party met and discussed the situation of these garment workers.
“We have to go visit them and show solidarity,” suggested a comrade.
“Do we have contacts or friends in that factory?” asked another.
“M lives in that area, she can take another couple of Party members. Let’s collect help for them and send it to them, along with the Red Flag and, if possible, a leaflet,” said a comrade.
We spoke with M, a worker and member of ICWP. She answered very enthusiastically, “Of course I’m going! Tell me who else is going to go. We’ll meet in the center of the city after we leave work, and we’ll go.”
Just as planned, comrades went to this factory to bring our Red Flag newspaper, leaflets, and solidarity support. They were very well received, as was our Red Flag newspaper.
“What union are you from?” asked the workers from the Florenzi factory.
Our comrade worker who lives in the area answered, “No, friends, we are not from any union. We are from the International Communist Workers’ Party that is in several parts of the world. This our Red Flag newspaper. We bring it to you so that you who are on strike can read it. And we bring a small contribution for solidarity that we collected. We will write a letter to our newspaper and if more aid is collected, we will bring it to you.”
A political criticism was made of the leaflet we distributed. We believe that the criticism has a good ideological point since there was a contradiction between Red Flag and the leaflet that had a reformist basis. Self-critically, the leaflet should have said that the reforms will not solve the problems of the working class, that only communism will. But this was the product of not having discussed it collectively, which caused it not to go deeper with our political line. Therefore, there is a need for the workers to know ICWP’s ideas, our communist line.
We are in a war for a system without bosses, without money, without the poverty to which we are subjected today. In communism, things will not be produced for the market; they will be produced to meet the needs of all workers. We will all be responsible. Therefore, we commit ourselves as Party members to also accept the necessary criticisms.
We are excited that women workers who are Party members are taking the lead in these workers’ struggles. They are contributing to the process of elevating these strikes over money to political strikes.
Another comrade ICWP worker who also went wrote: “They told us that if we supported them in any activity they did outside the factory as ICWP, it would be very helpful. We told him that we were going to communicate with the other comrades of the Party, and we said goodbye to them with a lot of class feeling and communist solidarity.”
We invite the workers of the Florenzi factory to continue reading Red Flag and learn about the fight for communism that is being waged internationally. A communist world is possible! Let’s mobilize for communism and build workers’ power.
El Salvador: Women Workers in Resistance Appreciate Communist Solidarity
I want to thank the International Communist Workers’ Party, its members and those who are affiliated with it. On behalf of the Florenzi Women Organized in Resistance collective, we thank you for the solidarity you have had with us in these weeks.
The help that you have sent has helped us with our everyday necessities: bread, gas, water, bus fare.
The quarantine started on March 19, 2020. We were supposed to be paid on March 20, but we have not been paid yet. Neither have we received government assistance. Because of COVID-19, part of the population received $300 and the city governments were distributing food baskets. We have received neither.
On July 1, 2020, we were notified that we were fired. The employer did not want to pay the required compensation. Instead, they offered us old and obsolete machinery. Some of us have worked in the factory for 20, 25, or 35 years. We are owed half a million dollars.
We are 113 workers carrying out this struggle. Most of the women are between 30, 50 and even 60 years old. We have not been able to get jobs in other factories—partly because of the struggle we carry out and partly due to age discrimination.
So far, we have been fighting for more than seven months. This criminal Sergio Pineda López is one more boss who has had total impunity from the Salvadoran state. Historically we know that the government never imprisons an employer.
We have taken this complaint to the Ministry of Labor. This institution and all the institutions have been disastrous for us. Faced with the rejection and total abandonment by the state, we have initiated a hunger strike.
We have been on hunger strike for 18 days, three women and one man. We have a lot of debts and the banks have been harassing us. Also, the Social Housing Fund wants us to pay up to this date. Otherwise, we will lose our houses. And we are not in the condition to continue paying.
For all our fellow workers, our situation has been very difficult, and our situation is quite painful. Each of the workers has their own story. But we all want to thank you and your comrades for your help.
—Florenzi Women Organized in Resistance, San Salvador
Workers Need Revolution, Not Elections
EL SALVADOR— “If you want, why not hold the meeting at my house? That way, my husband and my daughters will there. They have already read Red Flag when I bring it,” proposed a new comrade of the International Communist Workers’ Party.
In the first weeks of work this year, we have started three meetings of small cells of up to six members to discuss the struggle for a stronger advance within the maquila (sweatshop). The first thing we have done is to distribute the newspaper for understanding the struggles that the working class leads, day by day, worldwide.
Each meeting is planned for 45 minutes or an hour so that the comrades can give their opinions. It’s a short time to talk about the Party. We had these meetings in cafeterias after work. Now new comrades have offered their houses for these meetings. That way they would also serve to involve the family.
“The working class in the factories where we have members is opening up to the ideas of the Party and fighting to enlarge our communist line,” pointed out a worker leader. “We have also discussed the distress that the electoral parties are spreading, in part to win the government, also to try to confuse our working class.
“In the discussions in the cells, we still find members and readers who, in spite of struggling for a communist world, still follow the ideas of certain figures like Nayib Bukele or the fmln. However, it was clarified that as a communist party we are not thinking about elections.”
We are thinking of a massive revolution for system change. This was clarified with the ideas of a drawing circulated in the Red Flag group, which mentions that if the elections were for the good, they would already be prohibited. There is no doubt there is much to be done, but we believe that, little by little, capitalist thoughts will be transformed into communist thoughts.
—Comrade Worker
Front page of this issue
