Info needed on Del Monte outlets

WSN-  please read and help in any way.

Cameron Brooks

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"The business of obscuring language is a mask behind which stands out the
much greater business of plunder.  The people's property and the people's
sovereignty are to be stripped from them at one and the same time.
Everything can be explained to the people, on the single condition that
you really want them to understand."

Frantz Fanon



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>=====
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INFORMATION ON DEL MONTE OUTLETS NEEDED NOW!
posted December 5, 1999

[Information provided by the U.S./Labor Education in the Americas Project
(US/LEAP): (773) 262-6502, <usleapja@mindspring.com>]

In this alert:
Request for information on Del Monte outlets
Background

<><><><><>
REQUEST FOR INFORMATION ON DEL MONTE OUTLETS

Guatemalan Del Monte banana workers who have had to flee for their lives
need your help - and, for now, it's easy.

Preparations are underway for a major international campaign against Fresh
Del Monte Produce because of its cold-blooded response after workers had to
flee their homes when threatened with death - for daring to challenge Del
Monte's illegal firing of 900 workers in Guatemala.

When you go shopping in the coming week, please check whether your grocery
store sells Del Monte bananas. In fact, please check a few grocery stores
in your community, and then send the names and locations of the stores
which do sell Del Monte bananas to us at <CLR@igc.org>.

You don't need to do anything else at this point. We just need some quick
grassroots research on Del Monte customers (U.S., European, wherever).

Thanks!

<><><><><>
BACKGROUND
(Excerpts from Campaign for Labor Rights alerts posted October 21 and
November 18)

On September 27, Bandegua, a subsidiary of U.S.-based Fresh Del Monte
Produce, notified nearly 900 workers from the district of Bobos in Morales,
Guatemala that they were being dismissed and that three plantations would
be rented out to independent producers. Bandegua gave as its reason the
depressed prices of bananas on the world market. The union representing
Bandegua workers, SITRABI, rejected the sudden layoffs as a violation of
its collective bargaining agreement, but the company refused to negotiate.
Mediation by Guatemalan Labor Minister Luis Linares was met with complete
intransigence by the company, even though the union offered to renegotiate
its contract.

The union, which represents not only the nearly 1,000 workers in the Bobos
district but also 3,000 Bandegua workers in nearby Motagua district, then
held a general assembly at which it was decided that on the morning of
October 14 all Motagua workers would simultaneously exercise a provision of
their contract allowing any union member to request 10 days of unpaid 
absence.

However, on the evening of October 13, 200 heavily armed men with high
caliber weapons and assault weapons came to the union hall, grabbed two
members of the executive committee who were present and forced them at
gunpoint to drive to the home of the general secretary, who was dragged out
of his house and beaten before being taken back to the union hall. Again at
gunpoint, one of the union leaders was forced to call two other members of
the executive committee to "request" their presence at the union hall.

The first to speak was the president of the local Chamber of Commerce who
stated that Bandegua had informed them that it would leave Guatemala if the
demonstration were to take place on Oct. 14. He informed the union members
that this could not be allowed happen, that the town of Morales would
become a ghost town and for that reason they had to resign from the union.

Then the "commander" of the armed individuals stated that the only way to
correct the problem was to kill all of the union leaders. He ordered that
the leaders be photographed so that they could be identified at any time in
future. He stated that the union leaders would have to give a message on
the community radios instructing the workers that they should not attend
the demonstration the next day and telling the fired workers from Bobos to
collect their severance pay and get out of the plantations. The workers
from Motagua were to present themselves to their supervisors for work the
next day as normal.

Two union leaders were taken to local radio stations, where at gunpoint
they were forced to air messages to the workers in Bobos and Motagua that
the union had reached an agreement with Bandegua, that there was no reason
to attend the demonstration the next day and that Motagua workers should go
to work.

After the radio transmissions, they were returned to the union hall, where
a lawyer was being held by force. The armed men instructed him to draft the
union leaders' resignations telling him what to write and cursing him
violently when he tried to comment on the legality of what they were
insisting that he include in the draft.

As the lawyer was drafting the resignations one of the armed individuals
indicated that a telex had come in with instructions that the union
leadership had to resign from Bandegua also. A model draft of the
resignation letter was given to the lawyer.

After the resignations were completed, the union reps were herded into the
general assembly hall where the armed individuals conducted a session in
which they mocked the leadership and made dehumanizing comments about them.
They also forced them to make filmed statements indicating that the
resignations were voluntary and that they appreciated the help of the
people of Morales in making them come to their senses and desist from their
union activities.

At 2:00 am, the armed individuals gave them their final message that the
union leaders were to disappear from Morales and never return, that they
would be murdered should they stay, and then they left.

Guatemala press used the statements and filming obtained at gunpoint to
paint a picture of SITRABI's demise and capitulation to Bandegua, with key
business leaders trashing SITRABI in the press.

Negotiations for a resolution of the conflict between Fresh Del Monte
Produce and its Guatemalan union were broken off November 13, leading to
the initiation of the campaign against the Florida-based company. The
company refused to agree to one of the union's primary demands, the
reinstatement of 900 workers illegally fired in violation of the union's
collective bargaining agreement.

Meanwhile, the Guatemalan government has not moved to arrest any of the 200
armed men who forced the union leadership to resign at gunpoint and flee
for their lives on October 13, 1999.

An international campaign has been launched against Fresh Del Monte
Produce. The campaign is backed by the Geneva-based International Union of
Foodworkers, the AFL-CIO, European non-governmental organizations, the
U.S./Labor Education in the Americas Project, Campaign for Labor Rights,
NISGUA and other religious, human rights and trade union groups.