News

Over 60 activists met on Saturday morning as part of the UNI Graphical & Packaging visit to Venezuela. The meeting was organized through our affiliate Feutragrafc and chaired by the President Egle Sanchez.



Attending the meeting was the head of Graphical & Packaging Steve Walsh, the Regional Director for the America’s Marvin Largaespada and Myriam Farinotto from Argentina.



Over 10 unions were represented including both national and multi national companies.



Guest speakers also included representatives from OHS and the Electoral Council.



In her opening remarks Egle spoke about the good relationship that the Federation has with the government and the Labour Minister and the fact that the Venezuelan government is prepared to punish company’s that do not follow the labour laws.



Egle said that since 1999 there had been an increase in the number of union members organized and that the freedom of workers to join a union is respected. There are over 17 Federation’s at the national level. Egle spoke about the improvement in the social structure within Venezuela and how the laws had been modified.



Steve Walsh congratulated the Unions and the Federation Feutragrafc for the way in which they had organized in Venezuela and said that with the attacks on the trade unions in other parts of the world it was good to see a government who was prepared to support the trade union movement.



Representatives from many of the companies spoke about the situation in their workplace and spoke about how since the revolution workers now have rights that they did not have before.