Telefonica/Atento Follows Union-Busting Model in Mexico City Election

The union election held last week among 20,000 telecom workers in Mexico City was another wake-up call that the global economy simply doesn't work when it comes to workers' rights.

In a disgraceful example of global union-busting, workers at Telefonica/Atento who tried to vote for real representation were threatened and intimidated, offered bribes and kept from voting by company fraud. Unfortunately, this level of anti-union assault is simply business as usual for many global companies who have exported and permitted union-busting behavior at operations in other countries while continuing to recognize workers' rights at home in Europe.

"It is an outrage that huge multinational telecom firms, whether Telefonica or Deutsche Telekom, behave one way in Europe and then are union busters in the United States or Mexico," CWA President Larry Cohen said. "The tactics may be worse in Mexico but the results are the same. We need to continue to unite with the Telefonistas, the independent Mexican telephone workers union known as STRM, and fight back on a global basis wherever these companies operate."

The July 2 election was "won" by a sham company union, and CWA and telecom unions are planning protests and possibly a global day of action in September.

UNI Global Union had negotiated an agreement with Spain-based Telefonica that it would remain neutral in union organizing campaigns as it expands in Latin America and other locations.

But Telefonica-owned Atento "was anything but neutral," said Jose Cantu, a CWA District 6 organizer and vice president of Local 6229, who was in Mexico City to work with STRM and Atento workers, and to observe the election.

"On my first night, we went to a call center and a group of fighters showed up, about 25 guys with brass knuckles, knives in their pockets and alcohol on their breath. They threatened to kick and beat us." Three thugs were arrested, but the company got them out by morning.

"The next day, we had organizers on corners with two-way radios," he said. A huge group of thugs saw them and fled, but remained nearby every day.

Cantu and organizers from STRM went daily from one call center to another, leafleting and meeting with many of the 20,000 workers seeking representation. Before the election, STRM led a huge multi-union march through Mexico City.

Despite the neutrality agreement the company had signed, Telefonica/Atento ran a brutal campaign of threats, firings, outrageous lies and bribes, and denying the opportunity to vote to scores of workers while allowing ineligible workers to cast ballots, Cantu said.

Several years ago, CWA worked with Atento call center workers in Puerto Rico who wanted a union; they also faced a brutal campaign of intimidation from the company.