ELA demonstrates in the capitals of Hego Euskal Herria against incapacity for work and social insecurity

Euskaraz irakurri: Lan eta gizarte prekarietatearen aurka atera da ELA Hego Euskal Herriko hiriburuetan

The complaint of the job and social insecurity is the axis of the demonstrations mentioned by THE A taking place this Sunday in the capitals of Hego Euskal Herria, on the occasion of May 1, International Workers’ Day.

The union has insisted that workers’ organization is “indispensable” and “more important than ever for wages to rise above the CPI”.

In Bilbao, San Sebastián and Pamplona, ​​the marches started at 11:30 a.m. under the slogan “Borrokan ari gara, Let’s make an end to precariousness!”, while the one in Vitoria-Gasteiz started a little later, at 12:00. pm :00 pm.

Lakuntza: “The problem is lowering corporate taxes, not raising wages”

The secretary of the ELA union, Mitxel Lakuntza, criticized in the act of Bilbao the Basque government for “asking” the plants to give up the claim pay increases according to the CPI and has confirmed that “the problem is not to raise salaries, but to lower taxes on companies”.

“We have just lost 10% of purchasing power – 17% in the public sector – in the last decade when companies have declared historic gains and asked us to be part of a strategy of impoverishment in a society where wealth is distributed for decades. worse,” he said.

Lakuntza: “The strike, organizing and uniting people, is the best tool today to end uncertainty”

Lakuntza has confirmed that Euskadi is one of the communities where “big companies” pay less taxes “between bonuses and exemptions”, and has emphasized that these big companies “enforce more” than governments and that these public powers are “incapable” of defending the public interest.

In this context, he has denounced the energy companies “openly defrauding the citizen and obtaining historical benefits”, and made sure that the Executives “accept this scam and do not put speculators and scammers in their place”.

“By lowering corporate taxes and not raising wages, only one goal is achieved: increasing inequality and poverty,” he said.

Lakuntza has also referred to the insecurity and, after stressing that there are 541,600 precarious workers -311,000 women- in the Basque Country, he assured that ELA has made it a priority to end this precariousness, stressing that this goal cannot be achieved “by wasting time at tables of social dialogue that don’t even have an agenda. strikeorganizing and uniting people is today the best tool to end uncertainty”.

In his speech, the ELA leader called the war in Ukraine “and all other forgotten wars” and after calling for a peace agreement, he recalled “all” refugees, “victims of war, repression or poverty”.

Demonstration in Pamplona

In case of Pamplona, the demonstration started from the Plaza de la Cruz to end in the Plaza Consistorial. During the tour, participants shouted slogans such as “there is no shortage of money, there are enough thieves”, “military expenditure on schools and hospitals” or “borroka da bide bakarra”.

The demands for higher wages and equality and against precariousness were featured on banners that also contained messages referring to the temporality in the administration, “temporary of the administration for the consolidation”, or the claims of the workers of the cycle 0-3, “negotiation and dignity of schools in infantile”.

In statements to the media, the ELA coordinator in Navarra, Imanol Pascual, has not only denounced social inequalities but also rejected “the war in Ukraine and other forgotten wars such as those in Palestine, Yemen or the Sahara”.

The trade unionist criticized the fact that both governments and employers “are telling workers that this is not the time to raise wages“which he believes is “a major scam” as “both the electric utilities and the IBEX 35 companies have historical gains in 2021, therefore wealth is being generated”.

“The debate that needs to be had is how that wealth is distributed,” said Pascual, pointing out that there are two ways to do this, “taxes and collective bargaining”

With regard to the latter, Pascual emphasized that in the current scenario it is “more important than ever that wages rise above the CPI”. He added that in order to achieve this it is “essential” to workers’ organization and “companies that do not want to guarantee the preservation of purchasing power must go on strike.”

On this May day, ELA also has her “commitment to a vengeful and combative union”who is convinced of the need to organize workers for a better distribution of wealth.