Meet the just demands of the 210 workers of Industries Florenzi SA of CV in San Salvador, El Salvador! Support the Hunger Strikers!

Workers International Struggle Initiatives, the initiative of Commission 5 of the International League of Peoples Struggles, salutes the 196 women and 14 men employed at Industries Florenzi S.A. of C.V. who have been occupying their factory since July 8, 2020, to protect their jobs, wages and social security rights, and some of whom launched a hunger strike on January 7, 2021.

The company used the Compulsory COVID-19 Lockdown announced on March 19, 2020, to stop paying wages and stop remitting social security payments. On July 1 the company announced the closure of the factory and termination of all the workers.

WORKINS fully supports the demands of the Industries Florenza S.A. of C.V. workers which they launched on January 7, 2021, their “Day of struggle and solidarity with the Women Organized in Resistance of Florenzi”.

1. The payment of 100 % of the unpaid wages, overtime, holidays, Christmas bonus, bonds and other benefits owed by the Company

2. Judicial action against Sergio Pineda for violation of the labor law and retention of social security remittances

3. The judges of the first, second, third, fourth and fifth labor courts should quickly issue preventive measures to bring justice for the terminated workers

4. Stop the harassment by the Civil National Police, who should be protecting rather than pursuing the occupying workers.

5. Remove Rolando Castro as Secretary of Labor for not acting on behalf of the workers, Instead he has taken the side of management in its illegal closure of Industries Florenzi S.A of C.V and supported the suspension of contracts and closure of many other companies led to massive dismissals.

6. Condemn the Salvadoran State for abandoning 210 workers, mostly women, to the loss of their right to employment, to health, to housing, to social security, to a violence-free life for women, to adequate nutrition, to freedom of association, to the protection of the family, to a worthy life despite its duty under Art.1 of the Constitution that “El Salvador recognizes after the human being as the origin and the end of the activity of the State, which is organized for the attainment of the justice, of the juridical safety and of the common good. (…) and under Art. 2, that “Every person has right to life, to physical and moral integrity, to freedom, to safety, to work, to property and possessions, and to be protected in the conservation and defense of these same rights”.

7. We request the trade union and social organizations:

a) To distribute by all available means bulletins, posters or other types of propaganda that expresses solidarity with the workers and workers of Florenzi on hunger strike.

b) To organize actions or to send solidarity notes to the different human rights organizations in El Salvador, asking for the prompt solution to these demands.

c) Use our email address: [email protected].

d) Organize donations of money, of supplies, mats, water.

e) Hold media conferences or other actions to show their solidarity.

f) To visit the workers in the factory in person.

ILPS Commission 5 on Workers Concerns and WORKINS calls on its network and supporters to:

• publicise the struggle of the Industries Florenza workers in El Salvador;

• send solidarity messages to the workers at [email protected]

• protest to the Government of El Salvador at its treatment of the workers. Write to President Nayib Bukele at [email protected]

• mobilise any material support possible for the factory occupation and the hunger strikers.