Last week I was contacted by the Brussels-based European Transport Workers’ Federation (ETF) about a possible campaign in the Netherlands. A local leader of the FNV, the national trade union centre, had been sacked after having been the victim of a campaign of intimidation and bullying by Albert Heijn — a supermarket chain.
On the same day, I was contacted by the Inter-America regional organisation of Public Services International (PSI), based in São Paulo, to tell me about the case of the leader of an affiliated union in Guatemala who had been fired for her trade union activity.
The cases of Pawel Rudzki in the Netherlands and Lesbia Xiomara Conde Pacheco in Guatemala are strikingly similar. Both are union leaders under attack for doing what union leaders are supposed to do: representing and defending their members. And it was not a coincidence that I learned about their cases through the regional organisations of global union federations.
Here is how one global union federation (UNI) summed up what happened to Pawel: “Rudzki worked at one of the supermarket’s distribution centres for eight years. He played a vital role in organizing dozens of colleagues and leading successful actions to push for compliance with the collective agreement and improved working conditions. Despite being on track to secure a permanent contract, he was suddenly issued four warnings in two weeks during his application process — and then removed from the premises without just cause.”
As part of the campaign demanding justice for Pawel, workers gathered outside the company headquarters in Zaandam to protest the attack on trade union rights. As Dick Koerselman, the interim president of FNV put it, “Albert Heijn says it values its workers – but fires them when they stand up for their rights.”
As UNI reported, “FNV notes that this case reflects a broader structural issue in the Netherlands: agency workers can be removed without explanation at any moment, leaving them vulnerable to retaliation when they assert their rights. This loophole allows companies to undermine fundamental labour protections by relying heavily on agency workers.”
Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, in Guatemala, Lesbia Xiomara Conde Pacheco, General Secretary of the National Union of Legislative Workers (STOL), is also paying a price for being an effective union leader. Through a court ruling, the Board of Directors of the Congress of the Republic of Guatemala was authorised to proceed with her dismissal, despite her having been legitimately elected.
PSI, which represents 30 million members in 700 affiliated unions, was furious. As they described it, the sacking of Lesbia “constitutes a severe attack on trade union freedom and direct retaliation for her work in defence of workers.” They consider the attack on STOL and its leaders to be “a historical reproduction of the Guatemalan State’s systematic persecution and harassment of the trade union movement and, specifically, of the STOL.”
The differences between Guatemala and the Netherlands are enormous. The FNV is one of the largest and most powerful trade unions in Europe, with over one million members. The Netherlands is a wealthy country where workers’ rights are not usually violated so blatantly. Guatemala, on the other hand, is a poor country with severe inequality and a weak trade union movement following decades of repressions and attacks.
Despite those differences, trade union activists who stand up for workers’ rights are frequently attacked regardless of where they live. It is good to see the global union federations (such as PSI, UNI and ITF) taking the lead to organise campaigns in solidarity, often through their regional organisations. LabourStart continues to play a vital role by providing a platform and a large online community that can rally widespread support around the globe.
To learn more about the cases of Pawel and Lesbia, see the campaigns on the front page of LabourStart.
This article appears in the current issue of Solidarity.