A month has passed since Delcy Rodríguez suggested that Nicolás Maduro would announce a salary increase, a statement that came to nothing despite the multiple protests by public sector workers and demands from union organizations.
Not even the facelift that Chavismo has tried to sell under the facade of “economic recovery” prevents the promises from being carried away by the wind, since millions of public administration workers are still waiting for a salary increase that the Government popped up a month ago.
This Tuesday February 14 a month is fulfilled, exactly 31 dayssince Vice President Delcy Rodríguez assured that in “a few hours” the government of Nicolás Maduro would announce a decision on the minimum wage.
«I can assure you that in a few hours you will hear from our President, I can assure you. With a lot of patience, with a lot of wisdom so as not to break the balance, but to recover the balance with which the extremist right subjected our people in the last months of the year,” he said in front of Chavismo militants who participated in a march of educators, one of the the professions most affected by the Government’s salary policy.
It seems that for the Government, the 744 hours accumulated since those statements are “few”even despite the pressure exerted by university professors and teachers, which intensified this month with multiple protests and street mobilizations throughout the country.
The Institute of Higher Union Studies (Inaesein) registered 178 protests during January 2023, of which 88% were related to low wage claims.
Specifically from the university sector, the Monitor of the Observatory of Universities (OBU) recorded 39 demonstrations only during Januaryrepresenting half of the total protests reported in all of 2022.
Social discontent is evident in the constant street actions that have pressured the Government to give answersnot only with Rodríguez’s statements, but with arguments used by Nicolás Maduro himself to justify his inaction, insisting that the sanctions prevent financing an increase and that Venezuela was in a “sustained labor”.
«We will defend the income in a thousand ways. Giving birth to resources? We will give birth. Producing? we will produce Sooner rather than later we will pass from this phase of labor and resistance to a phase of sustained, sustainable improvement, of the integral income of the working class and the workers”, he affirmed during the closing ceremony of the IV congress of the working class, three days after Rodriguez mentioned the “few hours” for the salary announcement.
Denied the salary increase
The government that calls itself “worker” represents the main obstacle to decreeing a salary adjustment, since it was inflexible to reach an agreement on the matter even in the presence of the International Labor Organization (ILO) at the third Social Dialogue Forum held in the last week of January.
Despite the fact that the objective of this instance was not to set a salary, but install technical tables that would allow the creation of a formula to define the salarythe union organizations present insisted on the need to adjust as soon as possible, to which the representation of Chavismo headed by Francisco Torrealba, refused.
“The Government has not proposed to us in the Social Dialogue Forum amounts and date of a salary increase, despite our insistence. We regret that an opportunity to improve the very poor minimum wage that most workers receive has been lost,” reads a statement published by trade union organizations after the forum ended.
*Read also: Neither lava nor lend the pan: Government refused to set salary in Social Dialogue Forum
Even private employers, represented by Fedecámaras, agreed on the need to increase wages, since the purchasing power of citizens is necessary to increase consumption and activate the economy.
«For Fedecámaras, the main economic problem is the insufficient income of Venezuelan workers and families. The adoption of a decision on the salary issue cannot be postponed, not in isolation, but as a salary policy that makes salaries sustainable and maintains their purchasing power,” Fedecámaras highlighted in a release prior to the Social Dialogue Forum, an instance in which he expected the issue to be discussed.
Fedecámaras has not set an amount for the discussion of the minimum wagehttps://t.co/cvQBmT9fKo pic.twitter.com/wKuusmauy7
— FEDECAMARAS (@fedecamaras) January 23, 2023
devalued salary
The delay in the decision on the salary imposes a weight for the workers, since with the passing of the days, this amount loses its value.
At the time when Rodríguez tried to calm the waters by stating that the decision would be made in “a few hours”, the salary of Bs 130 was equivalent to $6.7. One month later, it corresponds to $5.2.
In the course of the last month, the official dollar established by the Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV) slipped by 28.6%, going from Bs 19.27 to Bs 24.25 per US currency.
As time passes, the bolivar will continue to lose its value against the dollar, so the expectations for workers are to continue losing purchasing power while the government continues to contemplate what to do.
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