ANCLA’s call for 19F
The government achieved the approval of a slavery labor counter-reform in the Senate. It is rushing it to be voted in the Congress as soon as the current holiday ends. They intend to do so on Thursday, March 19, and be able to apply it with bosses in March. We must prevent it with a strike, mobilization and a struggle plan until we defeat this counter-reform and all austerity, precariousness, looting and surrender of Milei, the IMF, the corporations and complicit governors.
Faced with this maneuver, FreSU (United Unions Front), announced a national strike and mobilization on that day, of which we must participate, promote, demand that it be prepared and extended to more sectors. We must organize to visit and gather workers, spread the word on social media and in each neighborhood. And after this holiday, demand and hold assemblies and plenary meetings of delegates in each union and sector to organize the measure, to vote for it to be thoroughly prepared and to guarantee buses and all the necessary resources to win the streets, and that it not be isolated, but part of a plan of struggle, with progressive actions and with a date, because in this way we will be able to defeat it.
The anger is growing and even the CGT is meeting this Monday, the 16th, to define. There is talk of another march and even of a national strike, only that they have just carried out the greatest betrayal in decades by allowing this attack on historical conquests, won through struggle, to go ahead. There is no confidence in this leadership, which may now want to accommodate itself after learning of the scandalous article that seriously affects the possibility of taking sick leave and that, if someone misses work, up to 50% of the salary will be deducted. They say that this was “added”, but it is another example of the perversity of this counter-reform that only benefits the bosses, and denies the story of the government and its accomplices. There is no “modernization”, only a return to the 19th century, when there were no social or labor rights.
Thursday 19: our call and proposals
From ANCLA, National Classist Anti-bureaucratic National Grouping of the MST in the Unity Left Front, we call to strongly promote a real active, massive and national strike, with mobilization to Congress and throughout the country, denouncing the traitorous role of the CGT leadership, while demanding that they call the strike and the plan of struggle that we need. While we act in these days in the networks, the neighborhoods, in each family and then hold assemblies to vote to join the strike and mobilization from each factory, company, department, hospital, school and in each union, place of study and social sector, human rights, socio-environmental, gender and diversity or retirees.
The mobilization of February 11 to Congress was important, with tens of thousands marching, occupying a large part of the square and the adjacent streets, up to 9 de Julio. With important actions in the country and thousands joining the strike of the combative and anti-bureaucratic sectors, as well as the call by FreSU, the confluence of unions like Aceiteros, UOM, ATE, teaching, health and university, plus the two CTA. But the action was not enough to defeat this attack and resulted in a first round in favor of the government, the IMF and the bosses, in a struggle still in progress that we must deepen.
There are responsible for this, in the disastrous role of the CGT and that of all the political and trade union opposition that, inside and outside Congress, has been allowing Milei to advance. On the one hand, with a part that gives him support, quorum and votes, including senators of the PJ who were key for the half sanction. And on the other hand, with a good part of the Peronism that opposes Milei “in words”, but with little or no action to prevent the government from moving forward. In addition, there is not a process of overflow to the leaderships, more generalized and bursting, although there are certain important struggles such as that of the Garrahan hospital that we must continue supporting, uniting and coordinating.
When the CGT does not call a strike, without organization, without clear calls or preparation with time and resources, it is difficult for millions to mobilize. When the opposite happened, we were able to defeat projects such as the Omnibus Law, with massive mobilizations and a national strike. There is discomfort and anger also because pensions, salaries and social programs continue to lose, below the poverty level, inflation continues to rise despite Milei and Caputo lie and manipulate it; hundreds of thousands of layoffs and company closures continue, tariff hikes, high prices and unpayable rents; the growing indebtedness of families; the adjustment to health, education, housing and public works.
There is anger and reasons to fight
This shows that there is a willingness to fight, but this energy clashes with a CGT leadership that negotiated and lowered the tone of the call, refused to occupy the square, to reach the fences and left the militant columns isolated, in the face of a fierce repression that sought to empty the march and to persecute as “terrorists” those who protest in order to be able to hold a session without pressure from the street. The road is different: every time we managed to twist Milei’s arm it was with strikes and massive mobilizations such as the university, the Garrahan or disability mobilizations, transformed into a national cause.
That is why it was not by chance that the only column that marched from its place of work, reached the Plaza and the fences and held the only rally and open radio in front of the Congress, was the one we organized from the Garrahan Hospital, with Norma Lezana and the APyT (Association of Professionals and Technicians) at the head, together with organizations of the Cabildo Abierto, the Internal Board of ATE, Autoconvocados and hundreds of workers facing the dismissals and sanctions that the government seeks to impose, being a reference in unity with other sectors. It showed that when there is grassroots democracy, real coordination, unity in diversity, with a clear program and decision, progress can be made.
In contrast with this orientation, the divisive and sectarian policy promoted by the Partido Obrero, followed by Izquierda Socialista in dividing combative trade unionism with the failed call at Parque Lezama, weakened the possibility of a unitary reference. While that call was meager and failed, the Cabildo Abierto at the Garrahan guaranteed an open and democratic debate and from the Hospital the strongest and most combative column left. These are not disputes or secondary debates: at decisive moments, the left must act as a factor of broad unity and not of self-proclamation. Reality showed which orientation connected with the anger and the need to add up to win.
While the CGT negotiated its income from union dues and the money from the social works, it surrendered the right to strike and even the prohibition of assemblies in the workplaces. A historical claudication that hits the willingness to fight, added to the backwardness in the conscience of sectors that turn to the right and buy the libertarian story, without being opposed by a convening pole that explains this loss of conquests. As well as the attempt to reform the Glaciers Law or the half sanction of the lowering of the age of punishability to 14 years for our children. The one that counted with the vote of the PJ in Deputies, including those who respond to Massa -the super minister of Alberto and Cristina, and candidate for president of Unión por la Patria-, who vote with the ultra-right. This reinforces the need to bet on a new political and trade union alternative for the labor movement and the popular sectors. It is necessary to build a new Central of workers, where the base decides everything, that is of struggle and independent of the bosses and governments.
There is no “modernization”. Nothing to negotiate, total rejection
It is a return to the past: with workdays of up to 12 hours, by enabling the bank of hours to no longer pay overtime and the employer is the one who decides when and how much is worked. By splitting vacations according to the employer’s needs, reducing and paying severance payments in installments, with a severance fund that exempts the employer’s contribution and defunds social security and pensions, paving the way for the AFJP. Or by liquidating the ultra-activity of the agreements and consolidating company and even individual agreements… There is not a single article that benefits the worker, each point seeks to make layoffs cheaper, to discipline and precarize.
The official verse and narratives fall down on their own. It does not generate employment: the precarious reforms of the ’90s and those promoted by Macri’s government brought more unemployment and labor flexibilization. It does not reduce informality: countries with “stability” such as Peru, Ecuador or Paraguay maintain very high levels of informal labor. It does not favor small and medium-sized companies: it generates an industricide with tax benefits only for large companies. It does not protect those who work on platforms: it expressly excludes them from the Labor Contract Law. It is not new: it recycles the worst recipes of Videla and Martínez de Hoz, Menem or Macri.
That is why the government wants to bring forward its treatment in the Chamber of Deputies, knowing that the repudiation is growing. It counts on the support of the PRO, the UCR and sectors of Peronism which already voted for it in the Senate. The call of the FreSU and of teachers and health sectors to stop and mobilize on Thursday 19 is a step to be reinforced. If the CGT moves forward with a national strike, it should not be isolated and to decompress. They must set a date for it now, with a massive mobilization to Congress on the day of the treatment, and that it be part of a real plan of struggle democratically decided.
From ANCLA / MST-FIT Unity we propose these concrete tasks to organize the mobilization to Congress to surround the Congress and the active strike. It is not enough to chew on anger, we must organize it. History shows that no government is invincible when the working people intervene decisively.
