Page Seven Digital
The Confederation of Private Employers of Bolivia (CEPB) responded this Saturday to the refusal of the Central Obrera Boliviana (COB) to engage in a tripartite dialogue on the wage increase. The entity said it had no interest in entering into “false and sterile debates” with leaders and demanded a meeting with the government.
“The CEPB has demanded dialogue with the Government on the salary issue, out of a basic sense of justice, equality and coherence, and based on ILO Convention 131. We are not asking to negotiate with other actors nor are we going to enter into false and sterile debates with leaders,” reads a post on social media
Together with these words, the entity publishes a letter sent on March 22 to President Luis Arce, in which they expose the current situation of the sector and request an audience with the president.
“The eventual decision to provide a salary increase – beyond its quantification – implies assuming assumptions of normality and economic capacity that, to date, do not preach the reality of the productive sector,” the letter states.
You can also read: COB rejects tripartite dialogue for salary increase and blames businessmen for abrogation of Law 1386
The CEPB stressed the “extremely hard times” that the sector went through during the Covid-19 pandemic and the collateral effects they are experiencing due to the armed confrontation between Russia and Ukraine. As for the first, they said that they have not yet recovered “normality and stability”, while they assured that the second generates “uncertainty” about the immediate future.
“We consider that the decisions made in the economic field, especially if they imply greater pressure on the entities that generate decent employment, must be careful and sufficiently measured, given that the productive sector cannot be placed in a situation such that poses a risk to the very continuity of the sources of decent employment that are still sustained in the country”, he continues.
You can also read: Without employers, the Government and the COB install the debate on the salary increase
“For all of the above, we kindly request your authority to include the Bolivian business sector in the process of exhaustive consultations, in order to have the opportunity to present our position duly supported and argued, in relation to the issue of the salary increase,” adds the letter, signed by Luis Fernando Barbery, president of the organization.
This publication comes after the executive secretary of the COB, Juan Carlos Huarachi, rejected the installation of a tripartite dialogue to deal with the 2022 salary increase and assured that some businessmen who oppose the demand financed demonstrations against Law 1386 of National Strategy to Combat the Legitimation of Illicit Earnings.
“Our workers’ demand is with the Government, not with the employers. Businessmen have always ratified management after management that it is impossible to pay a wage increase to workers, but it had not been impossible to pay for mobilizations against Law 1386, in the ‘coup d’état’. We do not generalize to all entrepreneurs, there are good entrepreneurs, but some entrepreneurs have given themselves this task, “he said.
