Comité Fronterizo
de Obrer@s
CFO
For the labor rights and all human rights of the maquiladora workers
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Comité Fronterizo For the labor rights and all human rights of the maquiladora workers |
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Comité Fronterizo de Obreras, for www.cfomaquiladoras.org After a Machinists Delegation in 2002, Hoover/Maytag in Ciudad Juárez Fires a Worker On January 2002 a delegation of the International Association of Machinists (IAM) traveled to Ciudad Juárez, where it was hosted by the Comité Fronterizo de Obrer@s (CFO). The Machinists had the opportunity to meet with Hoover/Maytag workers in the home of a maquiladora worker located in a low-income neighborhood. The visitors learnt about how the Maytag workers were resisting bad working conditions imposed by the company. Following a familiar pattern Hoover/Maytag was trying to save on operational costs. In Ciudad Juárez it was paying wages between $470 and $500 pesos weekly (US $52 to $55), including bonuses. Mas In addition to vacuum motors, Hoover in Ciudad Juárez was opening three new lines, and word leaked out that they were going to manufacture washing machines. Similar to what Delphi has done in Matamoros and Reynosa, Hoover made its workers work standing for more than eight hours, while the chairs that were taken from them were chained somewhere else in the plant. A number of workers complained of leg and feet ache. In Hoover, according to what the workers reported at that time, there was discrimination against pregnant women and older people. They only hired people younger than 35 years old. It is well known people after their 40s cannot find jobs in the maquiladoras. The workers said to the Machinists: “ Hoover violates the Federal Labor Law in several articles, for example they give out the Christmas bonus without including the perfect attendance bonus and the production bonus, when the law says the Christmas bonus should be based on composite wages, which include those other bonuses. The amount of profit sharing for 2002, usually given out nationally every May, was $860 pesos (US $96) to each worker. According to the law, companies are obligated to share 10% of their profits with their employees. A very negative sign was that Hoover obligated a worker to resign as a direct result of the visit. The worker, named Martín, motivated by the exchange with the Machinists made a positive comment about the delegation a few days later in the plant. When management heard about it, they made him resign. In June 2004 Maytag announced a merge of its Hoover and Maytag operations in one single company.
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www.cfomaquiladoras.org is produced in cooperation with the Comité Fronterizo de Obrer@s (CFO) |
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