The workers of several museums in Santiago and regions have been mobilized for several days due to labor demands.
The strike affects three national museums and 24 museums in the regions, including the Museum of Natural History, the Historical Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts in Santiago, while in the regions there is the Sebastian Englert Anthropological Museum (Rapa Nui), with a adherence of 80% of the 1,500 officials, according to Rocío Fernández, librarian and national president of ANFUPATRIMONIO, to The counter.
Fernández accuses lack of staff, salaries not approved by the rest of the Service (as in the case of security guards) and overly extended subrogations, with work overload, among other irregularities. Among others, he mentions the case of the Bibliometro workers, who do not have adequate food, lack access to the bathroom and other effects of working underground.
During this weekend the conversations between the authorities and the representatives of the workers will continue.
“On Monday we hope to have some answers,” he anticipated.
Lawsuits
Specifically, among their demands is the removal of the current substitute director of the National Cultural Heritage Service, Javier Díaz González, accused of labor abuse; streamlining the classification milestones for all female and male officials; improvement in the working conditions of the security guard team; and ensure a budget from the Ministry to attend to the labor emergencies of the National Cultural Heritage Service.
Likewise, they ask to solve as soon as possible the lack of staffing and pending remuneration improvements; the resolution of pending administrative summaries; ensure transfer of fees to the contract charged to the 2022 budget; as well as the constitution, as soon as possible, of a joint work table that allows to resolve in the shortest possible time the just demands of workers that have been postponed for a year, among other demands that ensure decent working conditions.
official response
Paulina Soto Labbe, undersecretary of Patrimony, expressed that the government has been willing to share, recognize and validate the demands of the workers of this Service.
“We believe that there is a debt that has been dragging on for a long time and it seems to us that it is the moment and the opportunity to advance together and based on dialogue for the resolution of these postponed needs,” he said.
“For this reason, we invite the associations to sit down at a work table, because we believe that together we will be able to resolve these demands. Today we are working together to finalize this instance,” he concluded.
