In Depth back to UNI In Depth home page 12/12/2001 Support grows for general strike in Argentina The Argentine trade union movement will hold a unitary general strike on Thursday in protest against the government's latest measures taken in reaction to approaching default on the country's external debt. The latest crisis was provoked by the IMF's action last week of withholding over $1.2 billion in loan payments to Argentina. The general strike is being backed by both wings of the ICFTU-affiliated CGT and by the non-affiliated CTA. Please see AP wire story below for more information. Support grows for Argentina strike Dec 11, 2001 -- BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) - The country's biggest trade federation will participate in an all-day strike aimed at protesting the nation's spiraling debt woes and its four-year recession. "We back the national stoppage," said Rodolfo Daer, general secretary of the General Confederation of Labor, known by its Spanish acronym CGT. He said the protest would be "the start of a campaign to defend and recover our salaries." Speaking at a union meeting Monday, Daer said he held Economy Minister Domingo Cavallo personally responsible not only for failing to drag South America's second-largest economy out of recession, but also for forcing middle class Argentines to foot the bill. Faced with a $2 billion run on bank deposits Nov. 30, Cavallo partially froze Argentines' accounts, limiting cash withdrawals to $1,000 a month. All other payments must be made by checks, debit and credit cards. As a result, banks have been flooded with tens of thousands of Argentines trying to open their bank accounts and lines of disgruntled savers trailing half a block back from most automatic teller machines. "I'm here to pay my bills, because luckily they deposited my salary," said Maria Gordini, a public sector worker lining up outside Banco Ciudad in Buenos Aires' financial district. "Next month, we don't even know whether they'll pay us." Daer added his voice to calls for Cavallo's resignation, saying the minister was to blame for burdening the middle class by freezing their deposits" and failing to turn around the economy. "Cavallo is a malevolent character who destroys everything he touches," Daer charged, using some of his harshest language yet against the Harvard-trained economist. Daer's more moderate faction will now join a more militant breakaway wing of the CGT, as well as the radical Argentina Workers' Center union, for Thursday's strike, which is supposed to last 24 hours. The protest comes as President Fernando De la Rua is struggling to find an extra $4 billion in spending cuts as he desperately seeks ways to regain the backing of the International Monetary Fund to keep Argentina afloat. And despite a rising chorus for Cavallo's departure, De la Rua has said repeatedly, and again on Monday, that he stands by his embattled economy minister in whom he said he placed his "personal trust." Meanwhile, Congressional opposition leaders have vowed to block what is to be the ninth austerity plan in De la Rua's two-year-old administration "There will be no austerity plan approved by this Congress," Eduardo Camano, the opposition Peronist leader in the Chamber of Deputies, said. Argentina's economy has been teetering on the brink of meltdown for weeks. In a slump for nearly four years, the country is fighting to eliminate $5 billion in annual debt payments by renegotiating double-digit interest rates on its $132 billion borrowings. Cavallo returned from an emergency weekend trip to Washington to try and regain IMF backing for Argentine efforts to surmount the debt crisis. Last week the IMF said Argentina's failure to meet key economic targets prevented it from disbursing $1.26 billion in bailout funds that had been scheduled for release in December. Strapped for cash to pay off hundreds of millions of dollars in interest payments due later this month, Argentina needs IMF and international lender support to stave off what would be the world's biggest-ever sovereign debt default. Copyright 2001 FWN ______________________ Union Network International http://www.union-network.org - contact@union-network.org