On Wednesday January 25, while the attention of most people was on the events of the World Social Forum in Caracas, an important meeting took place in the industrialized Guayana-region. The meeting, which was held in the meeting hall of Venalum (one of the enormous aluminium factories in the area), attracted more than 200 people, mainly workers and trade union activists from the basic industries in Guayana.
The title of the meeting was “The American Continental Forum, in defence of the health of the people” and the organizers included CVG Alcasa, CVG Venalum and was supported by the Venezuelan government. Although the starting point of the forum was to discuss health problems in industry, the discussion mainly focused on how to ensure health and safety at work through the implementation of workers’ control.
The meeting was opened by Gustavo Sequera, a comrade from the INPSASEL (the national institute for Labour safety and health), who made it clear that cogestión in Venezuela was to be understood not as asking the workers what they thought, but as a model where the workers actively took part in decision-making. According to him, a new mode of production was to be introduced, a socialist one. He emphasized that through workers’ control, health and safety could be greatly improved by providing more education to the workforce, improving infrastructure and the work environment.
Comrade Suárez, from CORESA (a co-operation between trade unions fighting to improve working conditions in industry), spoke at the next session. He pointed out that each year there are officially 250 million accidents at job places resulting in the death of 2 million workers – including 12,000 children who are forced to work because they live in extreme poverty. And this is just the official figure, which is only the tip of the iceberg.
Suárez made it clear that this is a result of the capitalist system, in which a small minority owns the means of production and tries to squeeze more and more profits out of labour. He stressed that this can only be combated effectively through the organization of the working class into fighting trade unions. He ended his speech by saying that the capitalists do not have frontiers, that they try to expand their markets and influence on a world scale. Therefore, the workers also need to organize and unite around the globe.
A particularly important session was introduced by Jorge Esparsa and Reinaldo Jiménez, two Argentinean comrades who had come to share their experience of workers’ control at the Zanon factory. This is a plant that has been under workers’ control for 4 years now, at the moment functioning as a cooperative. The comrades started by showing an impressive documentary video displaying their struggle for workers’ control. The documentary also showed the discussions at the factory, workers’ assemblies, demonstrations, and so on. At one moment, the video pictured a meeting in the factory where the comrades were discussing the proceedings of the struggle. In a very emotional intervention, one of the workers explained that, “We are just workers who want dignity and to save our jobs. The struggle is difficult and tiring. But I would rather die fighting standing on my legs than lying down!” At this the audience erupted in enormous applause and began to chant “¡La clase obrera unida, jamás será vencida!” [The working class united can never be defeated!].
After the screening of the video, the Argentinean comrades gave a speech where they pointed out that their struggle had not begun as an offensive measure, but in fact as a defensive measure. It was not a question of “seizing a plant to get power”, but a question of saving the jobs of the workers. The fact is that the factory was about to be closed and the workers were in danger of being sacked. In the struggle they realized that the only way forward was for the workers to run the plant itself. However, this did not mean that they wanted to own the factory themselves. As they said, the workers simply wanted a decent living, not to convert themselves into capitalists. That is why they demanded that the plant be nationalized and put under workers’ control so that “Zanon can be the property of the people”. Although the plant is now functioning under workers’ control, they are still struggling for it to be nationalized by the Argentinean state.
In the course of the struggle these workers also learned that it is impossible to put confidence in the bourgeois press. They therefore conducted a massive campaign to gain support in the local community, using leaflets, demonstrations, radio programs, etc. The situation they faced was that none of the three main trade union confederations in Argentina gave them any kind of support. But a key to the situation, as they explained, was the unity of the workers, not just in their own factory, but as a class. Therefore, they had gone to the other nearby factories to appeal for help and support and received a massive response.
Under workers’ control, the workers’ assembly is now the maximum authority in the factory, and the workers themselves elect the ones who coordinate the work, decide upon all the in-goings and out-goings, makes decisions on employment, and so on. They also have a certain rotation in the factory so that everyone learns new abilities and knows how all the machines work, how the process of production functions, etc. Thus the productivity of the plant is being raised.
The last speaker was Carlos Lánz, the president of ALCASA, who gave a speech on the experience of cogestión in the factory. He pointed out that cogestión in ALCASA is not the same as the reformist co-management that has been exercised in Europe. He said that even in the Venezuelan government there are reformists, and this outlook is not something that ALCASA shares. Lánz stressed that cogestión at ALCASA is revolutionary because it means that the capitalist relations of production will be eliminated, not just in ALCASA but in the whole of Venezuelan society.
The question is: Why do we need to produce? To benefit a small capitalist minority or in order to develop society as a whole, to the benefit of the people?
At ALCASA there are more than 300 elected spokesmen. The managers are also elected by the workers. Lánz explained that it was his intention, and the intention of the ministry to extend this democratic control. He explained that by saying, “I will be the last designated president. In the future the workers will elect the executive board of the plant and even the president himself!”
He ended his speech by making it clear that, “It is impossible to build an island of socialism within a sea of capitalism. Therefore we need to change society and the mode of production as a whole.”
This meeting was yet further proof of the extremely high level of consciousness and discussions in the Venezuelan workers’ movement. The CMR (Revolutionary Marxist Current) was present at the meeting and had a small stall with Marxist books and pamphlets that generated a lot of interest among the workers. Even though there was little space and time for selling, we managed to sell various materials, including some books, and we collected some addresses from workers who wanted to hear more about our tendency.
The experience of workers’ control in the factories is providing invaluable lessons to the Venezuelan workers. Through their own experience they are learning that the ideas of Marxism are a useful tool in their struggle, not just for daily demands but for the future of the revolutionary process itself.
Puerto Ordaz, January 27th, 2006