On November 7, the Collective Textile Factory Union (KOSIT) organized a march from the CODEVI Free Trade Zone, through various popular neighborhoods in the area, to the center of Ouanaminthe. More than 8000 workers took to the street demanding 500 gourdes ($11.50/day), a pittance. Workers also demanded free transportation, lunch room, health care and retirement. [...]
In just one week, 90 artists, musicians and writers from all over the world — including four Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonists — enthusiastically offered their support for the struggle in Haiti for a rise in the minimum wage to 500 gourdes ($11.50) per day! For their statement and list of signatories, read more… […]
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Exactly 9 years ago, on 1 June 2004, military troops of the MINUSTAH, the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti, invaded the country under the pretext of restoring ‘stability’. Quite the opposite. Instead of improving the situation created by the 2004 coup, MINUSTAH managed to increase the level of violence inflicted on a people deprived [...]
A brief, initial report: * The largest mobilization was in Cap-Hatien, with several thousand people. * In Ouanaminthe, there was a demonstration of about 1000 people, mostly workers from Codevi free trade zone and Caracol. * In Port-au-Prince, 600 workers from various unions came out of the factories to participate in a demonstration. The police [...]
By One Struggle — Rapid Response Network Committee Photos by Sarah Cruz and Marty Goodman (Names have been changed to protect the identities of union organizers). The garment industry is a global web of nightmares, where suppliers compete to offer their products at the lowest possible cost to stores like Walmart, The Gap and J.C. [...]