[Venezuelanalysis.com's Chris Carlson reports on the call made by various leaders of Venezuela's primary pro-government labour union, the National Workers Union of Venezuela (UNT), for all sectors of the organisation to join together and hold elections later this year. --Ed]
Orlando Chirino, coordinator of Venezuela´s National Workers Union (UNT) at a march in the state of Carabobo in 2006. Credit: Aporrea.org
Venezuelan Labor Leaders Call for Union Federation Elections
By Chris Carlson - Venezuelanalysis.com
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Mérida, July 19, 2007 (venezuelanalysis.com)—
Various leaders of Venezuela's primary pro-government labor union, the
National Workers Union of Venezuela (UNT), called on all sectors of the
organization to join together and hold elections later this year. At a
press conference on Tuesday, labor leaders Marcela Máspero and Orlando
Chirino invited all sectors of the UNT to a general meeting on July
26th to organize general elections and, in that way, unite the
principal labor union of the country that has remained divided in
recent years.
"Consolidation and Unity of the UNT' is what the event will be called," said Máspero yesterday. "We will refine the discussion, from the grassroots, about the destiny of the UNT, in order to carry out the electoral process this year because there is an expressed desire among all the sectors involved."
Máspero said that the different sectors of the UNT want a democratic and transparent electoral process so that there will not remain any doubt about the legitimacy of the UNT. According to Máspero, the unification of the UNT will allow for the necessary transformation of the workers movement and adapt it to the times of the Bolivarian Revolution.
President Hugo Chavez has criticized the division of the workers movement and has said that its participation is essential in the construction of the revolutionary project. Promoters of the new United Socialist Party (PSUV) have also said the construction of the new united party of the Bolivarian Revolution cannot advance without the union of the workers.
"We must be conscious of the paralysis, the division, and the separation from the center and regional federations," said Chirino, head of the UNT sector C-CURA (Corriente Clasista, Unitaria, Revolucionaria y Autónoma) "[This division] has been used by the enemies of the workers to increase the plans of capitalist exploitation," he said.
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