Venezuelan Milk Workers Demand Worker Control Following Sabotage Aug 21st 2013, by Tamara Pearson [image: Lacteos Los Andes plant (Lacteos Los Andes)]
Lacteos Los Andes plant (Lacteos Los Andes) Merida, 21st August 2013 (Venezuelanalysis.com) On Monday, 300 workers from Lacteos Los Andes rallied outside the Venezuelan national assembly in order to request administrative and financial intervention into the company. The nationalised Lacteos Los Andes processes and pasteurises milk, and produces yoghurt, juices, chicha (sweet rice drink), chocolate milk, oat milk, and jelly. It employs 3,375 people, and its products are distributed around the country through bread shops, corner shops, supermarkets, and the state owned PDVAL. Aporrea reported <http://www.aporrea.org/contraloria/n234780.html> that workers blamed the food minister Felix Osorio for sabotaging their supply and distribution. Over the last month, worker run cooking oil company Industrias Diana has also accused Osorio of imposing a manager on them and of preventing the distribution of their products. Lacteos workers accused some distributors of increasing prices, and said they discovered trucks with primary materials at the La Guaira port. Presumably such supplies would be sold overseas for higher than regulated prices in Venezuela, or is being stored there to sabotage production. Workers said that where as 15 to 20 food distribution trucks used to arrive at the plant daily, now only one, two, or none arrive. They said they believed the irregularities are part of a plan to bankrupt the company and hand it over to the right wing bourgeoisie business people. The rallying workers told Aporrea that because of the ferocious sabotage by their management and the food ministry they feel worker control is necessary. The bureaucracy has taken the company to the point of collapse, while the workers are fighting to take it forward, they argued. Workers said that Lacteos president Jairo Areyano has been completely absent from the plants and demanded that he be fired. One worker commented that Lacteos is self sufficient. We are for worker control as the only way of guaranteeing production and distribution, and that the surplus goes to the Venezuelan people and the workers. We arent fighting for any benefits [for ourselves], we want to recover the plants, the worker continued. Lacteos workers want to manage the new budget, as well as administration, sales and distribution. In a press release <http://www.lacteoslosandes.gob.ve/?p=2949>, the Lacteos Los Andes company reported a 15.4% increase in production in July compared to June. However other Lacteos workers, protesting last Wednesday outside the Valencia plant, said that due to a lack of primary material, production has decreased by 40% over the last six months. The Venezuelan government nationalised Lacteos Los Andes in 2008. During 2007 Lacteos had decreased production in order to create milk scarcity and increase its sale price. It was also allocating most of its milk to products like yoghurt, which are more profitable than ordinary milk. The milk scarcity also occurred in the lead up to the 2007 constitutional referendum. The private company was first founded in 1986, coming out of the old Leche Lacteos Merida. While most products that were scarce following former president Hugo Chavezs death and in the lead-up to and after the April presidential elections, are now available, if intermittently, powdered milk remains hard to get. ------------------------------ *Source URL (retrieved on 22/08/2013 - 2:03am):* http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/9961 20 New Communes to Launch in Venezuelan Capital Aug 19th 2013, by Ewan Robertson [image: The first elections of the capitals communal electoral operation will take place in the 23 de Enero district (archive)] The first elections of the capitals communal electoral operation will take place in the 23 de Enero district (archive) Mérida, 19th August 2013 (Venezuelanalysis.com) A mass grassroots electoral operation is being organised to elect spokespeople for communal councils and twenty new communes in Venezuelas capital, Caracas. The operation has drawn national media attention as these will be the first communal elections to use the National Electoral Councils (CNE) electronic voting system. The director of the CNEs Office for Citizen Participation, Joen Keiler Jimenez, explained to the media last Monday that while the CNE is providing equipment and technical support, it is the communal councils, through their own electoral commissions, that carry out the elections. The capital-wide communal electoral operation is a result of cooperation between communal councils, the CNE, and the governments Foundation for Communal Power and Development (Fundacomunal), with the aim being to elect new spokespeople to the citys communal councils. This will be followed by elections to choose the spokespeople and founding charters of twenty new communes in Caracas. The communes will then be able to formally register with the Ministry of Communes. Communes in Venezuela are participatory democratic bodies that promote local self-governance and undertake public projects to develop the community. The Communes Law, which was passed in 2010, sets the legal framework for their formation and their functioning. Communes are formed by groups of communal councils, which cover smaller territorial units and likewise exercise local self-governance. While there are over 44,000 registered communal councils, there are only around 200 established or developing communes in the country. *Community elections* The first elections of the communal electoral operation in Caracas will take place on 22 September in the 23 de Enero district, when twenty-seven communal councils will choose the spokespeople of the new Socialist Faith and Simon Bolivar communes. Each commune will contain twelve commissions of two members each, with around 50 spokespeople to be elected overall. It is estimated that over 5,500 local citizens will participate in the vote. Legra Serrano of the Simon Bolivar Commune explained to the media that the electoral commissions of the communal councils that are organising the vote are currently participating in training workshops provided by the CNE. This process isnt straightforward because above all were motivating the people. Its necessary for the population to actively participate, not only in the vote, but in [creating] the communal structure, she said. The activist added that there have been technical challenges to organising the communal election, such as updating the electoral registers of the sixteen communal councils that will form the Simon Bolivar Commune. The CNE meanwhile reports that in the first quarter of 2013 it offered technical electoral support to 823 communal councils, as well as supervising 400 communal council and 5 commune elections. ------------------------------ *Source URL (retrieved on 21/08/2013 - 10:31pm):* http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/9957 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- LAAMN: Los Angeles Alternative Media Network --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe: <mailto:laamn-unsubscr...@egroups.com> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe: <mailto:laamn-subscr...@egroups.com> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Digest: <mailto:laamn-dig...@egroups.com> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Help: <mailto:laamn-ow...@egroups.com?subject=laamn> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Post: <mailto:la...@egroups.com> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Archive1: <http://www.egroups.com/messages/laamn> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Archive2: <http://www.mail-archive.com/laamn@egroups.com> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yahoo! 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