The death throes of the Parmalat crisis have struck within numerous countries in the periphery. Headquarters, intervened by the Italian government, unloaded its branch offices, selling them off with the utmost celerity. These clumsy and hurried moves, often at ridiculous prices, have awakened the suspicion, of course well-founded, of their having had a fraudulent character. In this way, headquarters unloaded all the crisis onto the nations affected, and primarily onto the backs of the workers themselves. Parmalat did what had already been done by the Santander bank, el Bilbao Vizcaya, the Banca del Lavoro and Citibank. When it is about keeping the profits and transferring earnings the branch offices were considered to be part of the same economic unit as headquarters. When the default arrived, they washed their hands of the problem and left the branch offices high and dry.
As part of this process, on December 17, 2004 Taselli took charge of Parmalat Argentina, in exchange for a purchase price of one Euro!! Taselli is a well-known businessman specializing in the gutting of companies. This was the task he executed at Río Turbio mines, the San Martín Railway and the Altos Hornos Zapla ironworks. He operated in the same manner in all these cases: he took over the companies in crisis at a vile price, appropriated the subsidies or economic benefits granted by the State, pocketed the funds that should have been applied to investment, maintenance and safety, and attacked the workers and promoted massive lay-offs. At the end of his administrative period, what was left over was a mountain of debt and under-capitalized and bankrupt companies. The biggest price of this maneuver was paid by the workers. Fourteen Turbio miners died as a result of the state in which the shafts had been abandoned following Taselli's term of administration. Recently, two workers at Altos Hornos Zapla died due to the lack of indispensable investment in industrial safety.
Consistent with this, the first thing Taselli did with Parmalat was to declare bankruptcy. He presented a plan to convert it into a powdered milk processing plant, for which he only needed 30% of the personnel for production.
Since Parmalat employed 1,200 workers, this implied the laying off of 840 brothers and sisters.
Taselli's hopes for putting his plan into practice were disappointed due to the workers' struggle.
After six months of fierce struggle, the Parmalat workers stopped the layoffs and prevented the application of wage cuts and the refusal to recognize the union contract. Only a minority sector, fundamentally originating in administration, opted for voluntary retirement. A contract has just been signed making this agreement legitimate.
Taselli spared no resources to defeat the workers: putting on pressure, intimidations, firings, economic reprisals, non-payment of wages, physical aggression, an armed assault against the Carapachay plant (where the company logistics were housed) which was occupied by its workers. It was all in vain, in the face of the hardened resistance and obstinacy of the brothers and sisters of Parmalat. Marches, mobilizations, agitation, tireless visiting of workplaces, schools and universities in which solidarity with the strike was offered; the strike fund, and, first and foremost, the occupation of the plant.
The agreement signed is the first chapter of a battle of greater proportions. Taselli's plans are incompatible with current wage levels and more so with 1,200 jobs. What is under discussion, and this is going to get red-hot in the near future, is upon what base Parmalat should be reorganized. It is clear that Taselli is preparing a real dismantling. In opposition to this, the workers have to counterpose a solution that privileges their interests, which places on the tble the struggle for the expropriation and workers administration of the company.
There is no well-founded reason that justifies the collapse of this industrial center. Parmalat is a viable company. Its industrial branch is in expansion. There is a market and an unsatisfied demand for the broad and varied range of Parmalat products. The obstacle, therefore, does not come from the side of the workers, but rather from the capitalist administration.
Conscious of a new stage now beginning, the hardened brothers and sisters of Parmalat have approved a series of initiatives for action: to maintain the publishing of a strike bulletin, impulse the formation of a union-wide caucus, and maintain the strike fund campaign. The CRFI, at a recent meeting of its Executive Council, has approved joining this initiative and has launched an international campaign in support of the brothers and sisters.
