Message from some workers in Argentina via the Argentina Solidarity Campaign [1]

Dear friends,

We are writing to ask for your solidarity in our difficult struggle. We are workers of The Value Brand (TVB), a soap and cleaning products factory in San Justo, Buenos Aires province. TVB is an investment acquisition by the Swiss-American company, Southern Cross. We have set up a web site where you can learn about our struggle (www.obrerostvb.org.ar). There is also information in an article published on August 22 in the Argentinean newspaper Página 12, which we are enclosing.

We are also attaching a petition which has been signed by several national MPs and shows the solidarity that we have received so far.

Southern Cross has not only carried out repeated anti-trade unions activities against us; the oil company that it owns in Ecuador, CGC, has been involved in a series of violations of the human rights of a local indigenous community.
Thirty-eight of us have been illegally dismissed. The company refuses to reinstate us or pay their salaries despite having accepted the terms of the compulsory arbitration ordered by the Ministry of Labour of Buenos Aires province. Moreover it has made significant deductions from the salaries of workers who have not been dismissed but who have been carrying out solidarity actions.

They want to break our struggle by starving our families. For this reason we have set up a strike fund in order to be able to cover our basic needs. We are asking you for any kind of assistance that you can give us, including messages of solidarity.

With warm regards,
Franco Villalba
Union delegate, shop stewards’ committee TVB
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Petition demanding the reinstatement of the 38 workers of TVB, formerly Jabón Federal

For the right to organise in trade unions!

We, the undersigned, express our solidarity with the 38 dismissed workers of TVB, formerly known as Jabón Federal, of San Justo, Buenos Aires province. We demand the immediate carrying out of the ruling of the Ministry of Labour of Buenos Aires Province, under which the workers should be reinstated to their posts. We also consider that the TVB management has taken arbitrary and disproportionate measures against the workers, since in spite of the ruling of compulsory arbitration by the Ministry of Labour the management has sacked more workers, a measure that clearly violates all current labour legislation.

We therefore demand:
* Reinstatement of all the sacked workers
* An immediate end to all anti-union activities by the TVB management
* No more dismissals, for secure jobs!