HAITIAN TEXTILE WORKERS ARE ORGANIZING SOME BADASS MILITANT UNIONS!

In the summer of 2017 the textile workers throughout the country of Haiti brought their entire industry to a standstill with a nationwide strike. For months they held their line outside the factories, organized massive marches through the streets of several Haitian cities and persisted despite brutal repression and beatings at the hands of company goons and gun-thugs. At the strike’s apex, the workers sustained a valiant face-off against the National Police, who were mobilized by the employers in an attempt to drive them back to work by force of fear and physical violence. Nationwide and industry-wide strikes of this magnitude don’t just happen everyday. They are a major event when they occur, in any country. These workers were striking against the lowest grinding poverty wages in the Western Hemisphere, approximately 300 Gourdes ($4.18 US) a day before the strike. Capitalism is structured around the exploitation of labor.

The lower a worker is paid, the higher the level of exploitation that worker suffers. The importance of militant unionism and autonomous proletarian organization in this part of the world with the highest exploitation rates cannot be overstated. A combative and autonomously organized working class struggle with the capacity to place upward pressure on the hemisphere’s lowest wages takes a little pressure off the necks of every worker. It is in the interest of every worker to support that struggle, and, quite frankly, it is our responsibility—an aspect of working class internationalism. In the interest of internationalism, it’s important to learn from these workers’ efforts – their successes and failures. One unique element we think that needs to be highlighted is the independence and autonomy of these workers’ organizations. They are not tied to any political parties or NGOs. They are run by workers themselves, giving them a level of trust and credibility with the people’s camp throughout Haiti.

Course of the Struggle
The preliminary rumblings of the big strike began in January that year, when management at the H&H Textiles factory in the Palmiers Free Zone, of the Carrefour subdivision in Port-au-Prince fired five women workers for being known members of the union SOTA-BO. On January 25th, their fellow workers at that factory—who are also of SOTA-BO—warned management that they would go on strike the next day if the five organizers were not rehired, and circulated strike leaflets in preparation to carry out the promise. Management quickly rehired three of the workers to avert the strike. Negotiations about the fate of the other two workers dragged on through March, with management becoming more and more repressive. One manager, a woman named Khan, physically attacked workers, showing them no respect, and even head-butted workers to try to assert her dominance over them.

The workers at H&H had finally had enough. They struck that particular factory in early April, demanding the rehiring of their coworkers, the dismissal of manager Khan, and a raise to 800 Gourdes a day ($11.57 US). On April 12, a Haitian Minister of Social Affairs, Roosevelt Bellevue, came to H&H Textiles factory. He spent a lot of time with management, and did not bother to hear the workers’ grievances. Instead, he announced to them that the factory would open the following day (Thurs, 4/13/17), and that whoever wanted to return to work would be free to enter. For everyone who did not return to work, “measures would be taken”. To make that even more ominous, he announced that the police would be present. Nevertheless, the workers bravely determined to continue the strike. The H&H strike lasted about two weeks, ending on April 19, with the workers returning to the job in return for an agreement from management. Management promised to reinstate the fired workers, not fire any more after the strike, stop derogatory letters and dismissals, pay the workers for the legal strike days, set reasonable quotas, and relieve Khan of her authority to fire any more workers.

The H&H strike proves the power of working class unity at the point of production, even in just one isolated factory. However, no raise had yet been won, and management tends to break promises. At the same time, on January 31 in Ounaminthe– just across the border from the neighboring Dominican Republic city of Dajabon, workers of the SOKOWA-BO textile trade union—working in the Codevi Trade Zone—went on strike at multiple factories simultaneously, and took the streets protesting a government payroll tax on some of their wages. Thousands of other workers joined them to march. The Codevi workers were not protesting the concept of taxation in general, but the fact that the corrupt state officials do not give them any social services in return for the taxes. Their strike leaflet stated in part:

“It’s true, as citizens, we must pay taxes or tariffs. However, we must see where it’s going. In Haiti, DGI is collecting taxes and tariffs but as citizens we never get services. We have to do whatever we can to live without the services the state owes us. There are no roads, no electricity, no drinking water, no hospitals, no clean marketplace, public squares, no parks to play or for sports in the city. SERVICES ARE ZERO.”

The Codevi strike didn’t take the form of a complete permanent shutdown, but of a rolling series of recurring work stoppages and protests that went on for the next several months. In coordination with other textile workers in the south, the Codevi strikers added their voices to the growing demand for a national minimum wage increase to at least 800 Gourdes a day. Meanwhile, on April 2, Back in Port Au Prince, a conflict broke out at another factory: “Quality Sewing”, where a new chapter of SOTA-BO was in the process of organizing. Workers stopped work in protest over the firing of union members and leaders. Management called on CIMO, the equivalent of a SWAT team, to threaten the protesting workers. The situation was now ripe to elevate the level of coordination among workers throughout the whole Haitian textile industry.

On April 6, the Platform of Garment Industry Unions (PLASIT-BO) held a press conference in Port Au Prince, listing textile workers’ demands and called for countrywide mobilizations leading up to May Day. PLASIT is a coalition comprised of three unions in the three largest industrial parks of Haiti: SOTA-BO (Union of Textile and Garment Workers – Port-au-Prince), SOKOWA (Union of Codevi Ouanaminthe Workers – Free Trade Zone) and SOVAGH (Union of Valiant Workers in S&H Global) in Caracol (just east of the port city Cap Haitien in Haiti’s far north). PLASIT and the trade unions are affiliated with Batay Ouvriye (-BO), an independent workers movement in Haiti. Batay Ouvriye is an autonomous working class movement, which both facilitates the organization of trade unions and transcends trade unionism at the same time, recognizing both its necessity and its limitations.

May Day 2017 saw the unions of PLASIT-BO simultaneously turn out to march for May Day in Port-au-Prince, Ouanaminthe and Caracol, then return to the factory floors to solidify the unity around their demands. On Friday, May 19, 2107, the strike in Port Au Prince began in earnest. About 4,000 garment workers downed their tools and took the streets to demand an increased minimum wage, shutting down dozens of garment factories. The strikers proclaimed three core demands:

- A minimum wage adjustment to 800 Gourdes a day, on top of meal, transportation and housing subsidies,

- Social Services,

- The demand that production quotas (which are often set impossibly high) not increase with the increased minimum wage.

The textile workers marched from outside the SONAPI Industrial Park towards the presidential palace, only stopping when blocked by a full line of armored police. The Association of Industries of Haiti (ADIH) put out press statements claiming the workers had broken into factories, attacked the factories, and beat fellow workers inside the factories. No evidence was put forward to support these claims, but the Miami Herald newspaper in Florida published them verbatim without investigation. On Saturday, the workers took the streets again. At Sewing International, SA (SISA) factory, many workers stopped their work to join the demonstration, but were locked inside the factory gates by management. Eventually escaping to join the march. Thousands strong, garment workers blocked the road to Toussaint Louverture Airport. To break up the workers, CIMO, Haiti’s riot police, attacked them with tear gas and an acid water that irritates the skin. On Sunday and Monday, the strike spread nationwide, with the Carrefour Industrial Park’s workers joining the Sonapi Park strikers in Port au Prince, and the northern workers in Ounaminthe and Caracol downing tools and taking to their streets in unified solidarity. Factory owners and the government responded with repression, firing more tear gas and rubber bullets at the workers.

On Tuesday, the workers returned briefly to their jobs, but, with their demands still unmet, they continued the struggle in the form of sit-down strikes and slowdowns throughout many factories. Management continued escalating the violence. The Haitian National Police & CIMO riot police had entered several factories in both the Sonapi and Carrefour Industrial Parks that day and attacked the workers with clubs, beating at least one female worker unconscious. Many workers fled the Sonapi Park to seek refuge at their union hall and at a nearby radio station. Many workers had their phones stolen or destroyed by the police, because they were trying to document the attack. Many strikers were arrested and jailed. On Thursday morning (May 25th) the police in Caracol shot up the northern strikers with a hail of rubber bullets. In Port au Prince, the police occupied the Premium Apparel factory, owned by the powerful Apaid family, making it a sort of central command post for management and cops.

They selectively announced a lockout of the workers whom they believed to be leaders of the strike. Management hoped this would break the strike, but it didn’t. Instead, the textile workers then courageously threw themselves into the struggle completely, striking and marching in tremendous numbers each day throughout the remainder of May. In early June, they conducted a brief regroupment, with those who had not yet been fired, locked out or imprisoned returning briefly to work to replenish their meager financial resources, and then striking again and again every few days—either by walking out in a march, stopping work in a sit-down or rallying outside the jails to demand the release of their comrades. They kept this rolling strike going through all of June and July! During this time, the workers were again and again assaulted by the employers’ gun thugs and the National Police. On July 15th, National Police shot workers with real lead bullets at a protest at the Fairway Apparel Factory. Many were hurt, including a pregnant woman, and three were severely injured. Fairway Apparel then locked the workers out for the next two days, only reopening on the 18th to announce the firing of 13 of the workers they’d shot. The rest of the workers in the plant stood in solidarity and refused to work until the 13 were reinstated. SOTA-BO reached out to its international correspondence to send a flood of email to the managers of Fairway Apparel and the H&H factory (where similar terminations were taking place).

At Fairway, the pressure worked. On July 26th, Fairway rehired the 13 and agreed to pay the medical bills of all who had received bullet wounds on the 10th. On July28th, Haitian President Jovenel Moise formally proposed a measly minimum wage increase of 50 Gourdes (to 350 Gourdes—or about $5.47 US) per day. The workers considered Moise’s wage announcement to be an insult, as their strike action had already induced the managers at many factories to begin offering between 450 and 500 Gourdes a day to get them back to work. The workers were right, but Moise was signaling his clear intention to back up that insult with injury. On July 31, the National Police again mobilized in full force to suppress SOTA-BO’s planned march at the Sonapi Industrial Park. The police blocked the gates to the park, locking the workers inside it. Their guns were again loaded with live lead bullets, not rubber ones.

After long months of striking, and staring down the face of an impending massacre, the workers decided had done all they could in one summer. They decided it was time to regroup, rest and recover to fight another day. The goal of 800 Gourdes a day has yet to be won, and they are still the lowest paid factory workers in the hemisphere, but they significantly increased the wages at many of their factories from pre-strike levels, and even forced the anti-labor president of their country to personally increase the national wage a tiny bit. Most importantly, they came back to work as a proud organized union of workers who have proven they have each other’s backs and refuse to be divided. Their bosses now know that to fire one bean is to pick a fight with the whole burrito. The most complete record of that strike available in English can be viewed in full on the web page of the Rapid Response Network, a solidarity network founded to communicate this kind of news to the English speaking world, especially the US, and organize international solidarity for autonomous working class struggles.

In the three years since the big nationwide strike, they have continued to build their union, continued to conduct strikes, and continued to advance the demand for 800 Gourdes a day. Meanwhile, the struggle in the garment factories continues. On July 31, 2020, workers from Palm Apparel (a Gildan subcontractor) held a mass funeral for one of their co-workers, Sandra Rene, who died on July 19, 2020 because of the actions of Palm Apparel, a sweatshop in Carrefour owned by capitalist Allain Villard. She was 30 years old and six months pregnant with her first child. She died, along with the child she was carrying, because she was sick and was denied medical care. She was turned away from the hospital because Palm Apparel, where she worked for over 10 years, stole her health insurance payments along with those of all of its workers. She even asked the factory to loan her the hospital fee, but her request was denied. She was the second worker to die recently in an Allain Villard factory because of denied medical care.

On August 7, 2020, Sandra Rene’s coworkers at Palm Apparel, mobilized by their Batay Ouvriye-affiliated union SOTA-BO, protested outside the company gates when workers were locked out and the factory electrical generator was turned off. (Due to the economic downturn of the COVID pandemic, most companies are only operating a few days a week and are suspending workers arbitrarily.) The bosses called the cops. The cop goon squad shot at, tear gassed and beat the workers savagely, sending some workers to the hospital with head wounds. Some workers felt that only the presence of many witnesses spared from being killed.

Workers throughout the assembly sector are mobilizing against ongoing widespread collusion between crooked state insurance officials and thieving bosses (to steal medical revenue and deny care). Workers Struggle takes inspiration from Batay Ouvriye and aims to construct autonomous workers organizations and a movement in the US.

There is also a documentary

In 2018, a team of progressive film-makers who had supported the strike traveled to Haiti from the US and created a 25-minute documentary called Batay La, about Batay Ouvriye. The film is described on its official webiste. Workers Struggle will be organizing a series of online events at which we will screen and discuss this movie (as well as the need for workers in the US to construct our own combative and autonomous mass and intermediate level organizations to unify our common struggles) with the presence and input of one or more workers in Haiti who were directly involved in organizing the great nationwide textile strike of 2017, and are still involved in the struggle right now. If you work for a living and don’t enjoy being exploited, then keep your eyes open for the next such upcoming event! You won’t regret it! It is a conversation you’ll be glad you joined!

The event is completely free, though we do encourage donation towards our GofundMe fundraiser which is important for workers and laborers when possible to support each other’s organizational efforts. We would also appreciate the sharing of this fundraiser

In solidarity,

Email: WorkersStruggleMIA@gmail.com
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