The underhand tactics used by Nestlé to dismiss eleven workers from its Santo Domingo Ice Cream Plant generated a strong reaction from the unions of other factories of the transnational corporation in the Dominican Republic, but also from other food sector organizations. The first mobilization was a picket line organized at the gates of the ice cream plant last Friday 16, which will be followed by other demonstrations to protest against Nestlé’s announcement of general personnel cutbacks. Sirel spoke with several workers who were participating in this demonstration 

Sergido Castillo, Conflicts Secretary of the San Cristóbal Nestlé Union and member of the Latin American Executive Committee of the IUF’s regional secretariat, Rel-UITA, described why the group of more than 100 people had gathered in front of the Nestlé ice cream plant in Santo Domingo. “We are here to protest this new abuse committed by the transnational corporation, who has just fired eleven workers –he explained-, all of them victims of Tropical Storm Noel, which has left thousands of Dominicans with nothing and displaced thousands from their homes, with hundreds of people still cut off today due to flooding and wrecked highways and roads, and to make matters worse, when we’re nearing the traditional Christmas holidays so deeply felt by our families.”

Castillo announced that “This is the beginning of a huge mobilization that we’ll be carrying out, because Nestlé is continuously abusing its workers, specially at this ice cream plant. The San Cristóbal Workers’ Unions, which are present here today in this act of solidarity, the Union of Workers of San Francisco de Macorís, as well as our fellow workers from the Unilever Caribe Workers’ Union (SITRAUC) and the Independent Union of Workers of the Dominican Industrial Society (SATRASID), are all saying ‘No to the layoffs!’ and demanding the immediate reinstatement of the eleven terminated workers.”

For his part, Ramón Durán, Demands and Conflicts Secretary of the San Francisco de Macorís Nestlé Union, told Sirel that “We are here protesting, bringing our solidarity and support to our fellow workers at this Nestlé ice cream plant, who have been so vilely dismissed by management, breaching the Code of Labor, which makes these layoffs not only abusive, but also illegal. Moreover, the Collective Bargaining agreement itself stipulates that before implementing a measure of this kind, the union, as the representative of the workers, must be consulted. But the company did not consult the union in this instance, choosing instead to act deceitfully. This is not consistent with a corporation that prides itself in being the world’s leading company in its field, and which should be respectful of the laws governing each country it operates in.”

In conversation with Sirel, Bernabel Matos, Rel-UITA Education Secretary for the Caribbean, informed that “The company has announced its intention to meet with the unions, but we know that this is merely a formality, so that it can claim it’s sitting down to talk with the workers, when actually all it’s proposing is a dialogue of the deaf. In fact, the Union has reported that the company is offering the terminated workers one and a half salaries more than what is legally stipulated, in order to get them to sign their dismissal.”

The National Federation of Food, Hotel, Beverages and Tobacco Industry Workers (FENTIAHBETA) has called an urgent meeting for this afternoon, Monday 19, to discuss Nestlé’s threat of implementing a general nationwide personnel reduction, and to adopt an Action Plan to face this situation. At the same time, we are asking the Minister of Labor, José Ramón Fadul, to meet with us so we can explain the situation in detail and request his intervention to solve the conflict.