Within the framework of the XIVth Ordinary National Congress of the PIT-CNT called: “One class, one perspective. Comrades Luis Iguini, Eduardo Platero, Carlos Bouzas, Graciela Espinosa and Héctor Zapirain ”, this Friday Fernando Pereira terminated his union license to resign from his presidency to the PIT-CNT and run as a candidate for the presidency of the Frente Amplio, an election that will be will be held on December 5 and in which he will compete with Gonzalo Civila and Ivonne Passada.
Pereira said that he will never stop being part of the great labor movement that has struggled for decades to improve people’s lives, to improve the lives of the weakest.
“Today will be the last day after 25 years in the Directorate of the PIT-CNT, in the Secretariat and in the Representative Table, but it will never be the last day that I embrace each one of you to celebrate popular victories. , like the one we saw a few days ago in education, “he said.
He added that in a few days, Uruguayans are going to have a new popular victory in the elections to the BPS Board of Directors.
“Those are the Uruguayan unions, which for a century began the struggles for 8 hours of work and then for leave, vacation wages, family allowances and various incentives,” he listed.
He highlighted other achievements of the trade union movement that have been closer in time, such as the 8 hours for the rural laborer, the ratification of the domestic work agreement, employment for people with disabilities and the Law of corporate criminal responsibility.
Pereira referred to the importance of a single union central that was more alive and thriving than ever, “now facing neoliberal policies, among them the Law of Urgent Consideration (LUC) that came to take away rights and is so unpopular that nobody knows about it. , nobody knows the content and nobody can explain it ”.
“Those who are concerned about my departure, do not know this union movement that is collective, of unity, of struggle, of solidarity and does not forget those who are in poor condition, it supports the popular pots, it is in different brigades and serves free in the ABEU offices to all children with disabilities ”, he highlighted.
He stressed that the PIT-CNT is a union movement with a future, because it has a long memory to shout and pursue the cause of truth, justice and never again a military dictatorship.
It is the same trade union movement that will transmit to each generation the search for the disappeared. “Up the young people who fight to change society.”
The LUC an unjust and anti-popular law
Pereira also recalled some of the most resounding popular victories, such as the repeal of the Public Companies Law, the privatization of ANCAP and water. “Now we will be sons and daughters of the repeal of this unpopular and unfair Law that is the LUC.”
“There are few things that give a worker greater pride than being part of the glorious and beloved union movement,” he said.
He acknowledged that leaving the presidency of the PIT-CNT has been hard, but it was a thoughtful, thoughtful, thoughtful decision.
“It was difficult for me to make the decision and we took into account the opinion of many colleagues and now I say more than ever: Long live the union movement, the unity of the working class and the world of the workers!”
