21 days of a huge strike for a salary equal to the family basket aroused the sympathy of hundreds of thousands of workers.
The oil mill workers' struggle faced the betrayal of the strike-breakers of the CGT bureaucracy and its infamous social pact with the UIA (Argentine Industrial Union) and the  the Government
That´s the way to fight!

The oil mill workers faced the collective bargaining of the union bureaucracy and won a minimum wage of 93 thousand pesos
Their struggle and their demands are those of the entire labor movemen

Out with the union bureaucracy! Down with the Social Pact!

With assemblies, strike and setting up picket lines the oil mill workers faced the cereal monoplies to get a salary at the level of the family basket.

In a very hard struggle and winning the sympathy and support of thousands of workers who saw the claim of 93 thousand pesos of minimum wage as their own, the oil mill workers faced the collective bargaining of hunger imposed on the whole labor movement. After 21 days of a strike that began on December 9, the agreement reached includes a starting salary of $ 93,647, extraordinary amounts of $ 70,000 and a bonus in installments of $ 90,000. Similar agreements were reached by the SOEA San Lorenzo oil mill workers of and the nucleated grain receivers in URGARA, who continued on strike until January 7, despite the fact that the employers tried to divide them, paralyzing the ports of Cargill Alvear, Cofco Lima, TBB, LDC White Bay. In addition, the Dánica workers today are in better conditions to maintain their position in oil mill companies and they reinstated one of their dismissed comrades.
If the oil mill worker and grain receivers workers were able to win, it is because the employers and the Fernández government saw with horror that their struggle could become general not only in the oil and port branches, but also to all workers in the country, breaking the Social Pact. It is that like-minded unions stopped in solidarity and different workers' organizations brought their support because the oil mill workers' strike aroused the sympathy of millions of workers. The triumph of the heroic oil mill workers belongs to all the workers of the country!

The unity for oil mill and grain receivers workers is a key issue that questioning the collective bargaining of hunger of the Social Pact

The workers of the Oil Federation, SOEA San Lorenzo and URGARA had been complaining about the delay in the review of salaries, pandemic bonuses and percentages owed among other items, but did not obtain answers. The three unions came together and took a big step in their fight. It was thus that they came to paralyze the grain industry of Argentina and stop exports with more than 130 boats stranded without being able to load or unload, in a sector where capitalists and grain monopolies have been making huge fortunes and with the soy price rising .
The striking workers knew they could succeed, because they know of the millions of dollars that the employers of the agro-industry and the cereal companies take. They could pay them the salary for which they fought with a minimum percentage of their income: between 0.5% and 1.2%. Even the oil producers affirmed "that they show the balance sheets" when the employer's association argued that they had losses so as not to give them the increase. With the same argument from the bosses and their "crisis" due to the pandemic, the launched the most infamous attacks on us: they lowered wages, destroyed the collective bargaining, fired and made millions of workers more flexible. They have no crisis! Let all the bosses show their ledgers!

With the strike of the Intersindical Marítima Portuaria, (Inter-union of dock workers), the best conditions were given to generalize their struggle for wages with which the country's workers began to get along with

On December 23, in solidarity with the struggle of oil mill and grain receivers workers, the Intersindical Marítima Portuaria y Afines del Cordón Industrial, which brings together the workers of the Bosses and Fisheries Officials, from SEAMARA, SUSB, SOMU, SUTRAVIP, SUPA de San Lorenzo, AJEPROMM and UTHGRA, among others, declared a 36-hour strike, joining to the great oil mill workers' strike. For their part, the trucks did not leave their loading points so they did not move from the different plants. In this way, by withdrawing transport from the terminals and plants, this key sector for the cereal companies gave enormous support to the strike of the oil mill workers, demonstrating that the weight of this in production and export could bring together different sectors of workers of the country.
A call from the oil mill from the gates of Dreyfus and the port of San Lorenzo would have put the working class in the best conditions to be able to coordinate their resistance, uniting their demands for work and wages together with those of oil mill workers. Thus they could have   turn that strike into a path to dig in, against the surrender of the union bureaucracy and its infamous Social Pact to defeat the attack of the capitalists and their government. This way we would have even prevented the theft from pensioners voted in the Parliament.
The oil mill worker strike questioned that the CGT and CTA bureaucrats, who left the oil mill and receivers workers fighting alone, were fired, as it did with all the struggles in 2020. These traitors are the main supporters of the bosses’ attack led by the Fernándezes Government, which subjected the working class to thousands of sufferings, signing hunger collective bargaining in the face of devaluation and inflation, and leaving alone the workers who went out to fight in tough resistance struggles, even facing his gunmen and the murderous police of Fernández

Dozens of workers 'organizations, unemployed movements, trade unions and internal commissions, spoke out and expressed solidarity with the oil mill workers' strike, taking their support to the picket line. But unfortunately this did not translate into actions, following the example of the Inter sindical Marítima (Inter-Union Maritime) strike, since many of them were claiming collective bargaining and a year-end bonus. And this was the moment to get it. The combative unionism and the unemployed movements led and influenced by the FIT-U, such as SUTNA, SUTEBAs Multicolor, UF Haedo, Subte, Frigoríficos, CICOP, Polo Obrero. MST-Teresa Vive, etc., and even the FIT-U itself, unfortunately they did not put all their forces to coordinate the workers' resistance together with the oil mill workers strike. They did not use all their strength to strike like a fist against the infamous Social Pact with which those from above and the Fernández government declared war on us, led by imperialism and the IMF. If they had done so, all the unemployed in the country would also have had a fulcrum to fight for decent work and break with the picket bureaucracy that subjects them to the begging of the ministries and the Church.
Even the industrial cordon, from San Lorenzo to the north of Buenos Aires, where the largest steel companies in the country are located, could have been a fighting bastion for the entire working class. If the Acindar Internal Commission, which stood in solidarity with the oil mill workers strike , had put the metallurgists on their feet, who had come from suffering the surrender of their salary by the business union bureaucracy of Caló, when they began to say "Let's go for the 93 thousand!". For example, Miguez from the Tendencia of the PO, (Tendency of Workers Party) and a member of Acindar's internal commission, who supported Dreyfus, if he had called for a general assembly to vote actions in support of the oil mill workers strike, this would have been a huge and decisive step in order to ignore and break the miserable collective bargaining signed by Caló unifying the fight of the oil mill workers for the 93 thousand pesos of minimum wage for all metallurgists.
Generalizing this fight is a reassurance so that the oil mill workers, who gave so much of themselves, can maintain their conquest before the bosses and the government, which will seek to redouble their attack. That conquest must be defended! The fight is not over; it is just one round in a fight for all our demands and for defeating the capitalists and their government.
It is that the bosses will want to snatch the oil mill workers, sooner or later, with devaluation, inflation, salary taxes, layoffs and attacking the agreements, which they conquered by coordinating all the agro-industrial unions of the San Lorenzo cordon.

There is no time to lose! We must generalize the struggle of the oil mill workers strike for 93 thousand pesos to the entire labor movement of the country!
The unitary struggle of oil mill workers together with receivers and other sectors, which paralyzed production and shipping, showed all workers the billions of dollars that the agro-business bosses and the cereal companies’ bill, in addition to the millionaire income that the oligarchy receives. The capitalists do not have any crisis; it is the workers who suffer the crisis that they threw at us. We must put the wealth of the nation in the hands of the working class! There will be the money to make real a minimum salary of 93 thousand pesos for everyone! There is plenty of money to guarantee quality work, housing, health and education for employed and unemployed workers!
No sector can continue fighting alone! A decisive struggle must be prepared so that once and for all the working class can obtain all its demands! The oil mill workers have all the authority gained in combat to call and organize it!
WE CANNOT FIGHT DIVIDIDED ANY MORE! The unions and movements of combative unemployed people, internal commissions and delegates opposed to the union bureaucracy, have to put all their forces and lead together with the oil mill workers the fight to defeat the attack against the workers, setting up a National Command of Struggle with a single list of demands: The only demand that opens the path to a general strike, retaking the path of the revolutionary combats of December 2017.
Out with the business union bureaucracy! Down with the Social Pact!  National Fighting Coordinator of employed and unemployed workers! Jobs for all! Immediate reinstatement of all fired workers!                                     

Unique National Collective Bargaining! Minimum, vital and moving salary of $ 93,000 for the entire labor movement! Enough begging and handouts! $ 51,000 of unemployment insurance for everyone!                       Sliding scale of working hours! 6 hours of work without salary reduction and one more shift in all factories!        Enough of labor flexibility! Do not touch the collective bargains!   Immediate hiring of all contractors and hired workers as permanent employees! Down with the wage tax!
Freedom for Romero and all the prisoners for fighting! Dropping all charges against Ruiz, Arakaki, Ponce and of all the persecuted workers and fighters!
Those from above come for all, we have to go for all of them!

By Workers Democracy (LOI-CI) Editorial Board