Fighting Forward – A Luta Continua! During their addresses, delegates from the young international industry union federation’s second congress held in Rio de Janeiro (04 – 07 October) overwhelmingly adopted A Luta Continua! as their slogan; one which is particularly apt for Brazil’s former leader’s native soil, where the iconic ex-President Lula is seen as symbolic of the attacks against which the union movement is laboring, the slogan also refers to the struggle between employee organizations and global capitalism with consequences for workers that include the two other major priorities underpinning the federation’s action program and policy resolution, namely, precarious employment, and labor rights violations. One of the emergency resolutions adopted intends for the federation to initiate action to revoke the global framework agreement signed with Volkswagen if the German automaker “doesn’t respect workers’ rights, in he plant at Chattanooga (USA)”. The union federation that came about four years ago from the merger of three different federations (metals, chemicals, textiles) is looking to sign ‘binding’ global agreements.
Union merger, done and dusted. The merger between the metals, chemicals, and textiles federations is now complete (c.f. article No. 120414), or at least the toughest stages are over. Outgoing secretary general, Jyrki Raina made no attempt to gloss over what had been from time to time a difficult process of coalescing different cultures and ways of working. The merger process did not however hinder the new federation from stepping in on occasion to assist national organizations that may have been struggling with business or political bodies, with Bangladesh’s textile sector safety agreement being the high point of the body’s mandate to date (c.f.
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