|
COPYRIGHT 2003 The Dallas Morning News
Byline: Dianne Solis
Dec. 21--RIO BRAVO, Mexico-For two years, Carmen Julia Silva made fancy shopping bags for clothes she could never afford to buy. The bags were branded with such status symbols as Neiman Marcus, Banana Republic and Gap.
For her labor, she made about $40 a week at a U.S.-owned factory with a Spanglish name, Duro Bag, or Tough Bag - not quite enough to keep clothes on her own back. So from her outpost in this dusty border town across from McAllen, she resolved to unite workers and demand salary hikes in this factory, known as a maquila. An independent union, free of the corruption that has marred Mexico's traditional labor movement, could provide that, she reasoned.
But her effort failed. To hear Ms. Silva tell it, one organizer was threatened with a machine gun, and, when it came time to vote, some workers were taken by the arm and told that a vote for the competing union with close ties to the government would be a good choice.
"We have to fight against our own government for the right to organize," says Ms. Silva, a 28-year-old woman with a direct manner of speaking.
Workers thought they might find some redress by using a labor rights side accord to the North American Free Trade Agreement. But 10 years after the passage of the historic pact, workers and advocates who have used the labor side pact say its value is dubious.
About two dozen cases have been submitted to the agencies charged with advocating enforcement of labor and safety laws in NAFTA's commercial trade bloc of...
Read the full article for free courtesy of your local library.
|
Bookmark this article
Print this article
Link to this article
Email this article
Digg It!
Add to del.icio.us
RSS
