Cuba’s draconian plan to lay off 10 percent of its workforce is running into a slew of problems — not the least of which are the growing fights over who will wind up on the street.
Cuban and foreign economists say it’s too much, too fast.
Radical leftists are branding Raúl Castro as a capitalist exploiter of workers and – in an odd alignment with Cuban dissidents – are urging workers to fight the job cuts.
One well-known historian and Communist Party member has warned of social chaos, maybe even a mass exodus, and cautioned that the layoffs may be unconstitutional.
Workers desperately trying to keep their jobs are accusing others of corruption. And some blacks and women are warning that those sectors may be hardest hit by the job cuts. [...]
Some Cubans say they are not overly concerned by the job cuts because Castro has promised that no worker “will be left unprotected.’’ The island will eventually muddle through the crisis, they say. [...]
Article 45 of the Cuban constitution also says that a job “in socialist society is a right, a duty and an honor,’’ he added. A group of Afro-Cubans, the Cofradía de la Negritud, in a Sept. 22 declaration urged blacks who believe they are to be dismissed for racial reasons to “not accept this passively and be ready to defend their labor rights.’’
Cuban women also have warned against discriminating against them in the layoffs, with one writer noting that women hold 80 percent of the administrative jobs – a sector singled out for deep cutbacks. [...]
Even the leftist International League of Workers, active mostly in Latin America, blasted the layoffs as “a classic capitalist plan’’ and added: “The true defense of socialism in Cuba today means supporting the workers against this plan and ...demanding the right to strike.’’
Castro has promised that the process of selecting those who will keep their jobs will be done not on the basis of seniority but “with strict observance of the principle of suitability.’’ [...]
Workers at the enterprise used to happily kick back their meager salaries to supervisors in exchange for the chance to earn much more by stealing supplies and cheating customers, Celaya wrote, comparing the arrangement to a “Sicilian mafia.’’ [...]
Léanlo todo, no tiene desperdicio, y pásenlo a sus amigos que viven haciendo apología del terror castrista.
Otra utopía más que se da de jeta contra la realidad, ese invento de la derecha reaccionaria para perjudicar al pueblo trabajador.
ReplyDeleteLo de "workers" es un eufemismo.
ReplyDelete"A group of Afro-Cubans, the Cofradía de la Negritud."
ReplyDeleteJajajaja otra que el Sindicato de Cirilos.