Declaration of Solidarity with the Student Strike at the University of Puerto Rico

[fredbergen]

A las y los estudiantes en huelga en la Universidad de Puerto Rico:

Desde la Universidad de la Ciudad de Nueva York (CUNY), les brindamos nuestros fervorosos saludos solidarios. Vuestra resistencia combativa, en contra del recorte del presupuesto de la UPR, la eliminación de las exenciones de matrícula y la privatización, debe servir de inspiración para los estudiantes, docentes y trabajadores de la educación que enfrentan el asedio patronal aquí y en todo Estados Unidos. Aquí en la CUNY, nos enfrentamos también a una ola de recortes, despidos y alzas de cuotas. Bajo el rótulo de la crisis económica, el derecho a la educación sufre un ataque frontal, mientras Wall Street goza de millones de millones de dólares en créditos del “rescate” bancario.

Para nosotros de los Internationalist Clubs, que luchamos por la matrícula abierta y una educación universitaria gratuita (“open admissions and no tuition”), la batalla en defensa de la educación pública es una lucha de clases. Los capitalistas buscan reorganizar el sistema de educación al servicio de sus intereses, llevando a cabo una “purga racista y clasista” que limitaría la educación superior para que sólo una élite pueda tener acceso. Para resistir esta embestida, claro está, es crucial el despliegue de la fuerza de la clase trabajadora. Así que creemos que el respaldo de la FMPR, UTIER, UGT y CGT a la huelga estudiantil de la UPR tiene un potencial enorme para derrotar el ataque del gobierno colonial.

La acción conjunta y masiva de los estudiantes y los trabajadores –en Puerto Rico, en los EE.UU. y por doquier– es la clave para vencer. El “poder estudiantil” es un sueño ilusorio, pero junto con la clase obrera tenemos el poder. Consideramos que la reivindicación de la educación pública, de alta calidad y gratuita para todos, junto con otros reclamos democráticos (incluso el de la independencia de Puerto Rico), sólo será asegurada cuando los que producimos la riqueza tomamos el poder y se extiende una revolución socialista a escala internacional.

Con vuestra valiente huelga y ocupación, compañeras y compañeros de la Universidad de Puerto Rico, están haciendo un importante paso adelante para el movimiento internacional. Desde el corazón del imperialismo les extendemos un abrazo fuerte y solidario.

Palante por la victoria de la huelga de la UPR, ¡Viva!

CUNY Internationalist Clubs
26 de abril de 2010
[email protected]
www.internationalist.org

-------------------

To the students on strike at the University of Puerto Rico

From the City University of New York (CUNY) we send enthusiastic greetings of solidarity. Your militant resistance against cuts to the budget of the UPR, against the elimination of tuition exemptions and against privatization should be an inspiration to students, teachers and education workers who are under siege all over the United States. Here at CUNY we are also facing a wave of budget cuts, layoffs and tuition hikes. Under the guise of the economic crisis, the right to education is under attack, while Wall Street enjoys trillions of dollars in credits from the “bailout” of the banks.

We in the CUNY Internationalist Clubs, who fight for open admissions and no tuition, see defense of public education as a class struggle. The capitalists are seeking to reorganize the educational system in their interests, carrying out a “race and class purge” which would limit access to higher education to an elite. In order to resist this onslaught, it is crucial to bring the power of the working class into play. Thus the support to the UPR student strike by the FMPR (teachers), UTIER (electrical workers) and UGT and CGT union federations has a tremendous potential to defeat the attack by the colonial government.

Joint mass action by the students and workers – in Puerto Rico, the U.S. and elsewhere – is key to winning. “Student power” is an illusion, but together with the working class we have the power. In our view, the demand for free, quality public education for all, along with other democratic demands (including for the independence of Puerto Rico) will only be assured when those who produce the wealth take power and extend socialist revolution internationally.

With your courageous strike and occupation, compañeras and compañeros of the University of Puerto Rico, you are making an important step forward for the international movement. From the heart of imperialism we extend our hearty embrace of solidarity.

Victory to the UPR strike!

CUNY Internationalist Clubs
April 26, 2010
[email protected]
www.internationalist.org

[fredbergen]

11 May 2010: Demonstration at CCH-SUR/UNAM (National University of Mexico) in solidarity with the UPR strike.

[Raúl Duke]

(including for the independence of Puerto Rico)

Not everyone who's in the student strikes is an independentista.

A few friends of mine are part of the strike, others are ambivalent, while others take it as "free time" (although it brings certain consequences such as lengthening the semester over the summer break, etc so you don't really gain any free time).

[gorillafuck]

Not everyone who's in the student strikes is an independentista.

A few friends of mine are part of the strike, others are ambivalent, while others take it as "free time" (although it brings certain consequences such as lengthening the semester over the summer break, etc so you don't really gain any free time).
How popular is the Puerto Rican independence movement?

[the last donut of the night]

Is class consciousness and the revolutionary movement stronger in PR?

[fredbergen]

http://www.internationalist.org/internationalistlogo.png
May 2010





“Shock Force” Riot Police Assault Students and Workers


Puerto Rico: Beatings at the Sheraton

http://www.internationalist.org/macanazosheraton11005.jpg
The militarized Shock Force of the Puerto Rican Police threw demonstrators to the ground, beat them with riot clubs and sprayed them with tear gas and pepper spray at the Sheraton Hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico, on the evening of May 20. (Photo: Xavier Araújo/El Nuevo Día)




From our correspondent

SAN JUAN, May 20 – This evening, there was a picket of several hundred students of the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) and workers from a number of sectors, including port workers, university professors and many others. The picket was held in front of a fancy fundraising dinner for businessmen where Governor Luis Fortuño was to give a speech.

When several dozen students entered the luxurious restaurant of the Sheraton Hotel in the Convention Center where the event was being held and tried to go up to where the privatizing, anti-worker governor was scheduled to speak, the notorious Fuerza de Choque (Shock Force) riot squad of the Puerto Rican Police poured in and savagely beat the students, spraying pepper gas in their faces and in some cases directly into their eyes.

The Shock Force brutally beat many students, as well as some older ladies. When the students managed to escape, the police took off after them and charged into the workers who were still picketing the hotel. This militarized police force also fired off large amounts of tear gas, to the point that a cloud of gas hung over the area.

The police also beat and pepper-sprayed a number of union leaders in the face, among them the president of the UGT (General Workers Union), Manuel Perfecto, a representative of the Puerto Rican Labor Federation (FTPR), John Viguera, as well as the president of the Solidarity Union Movement (MSS), José Rodríguez.

Perfecto estimated that more than 25 people were injured. “They threw them on the ground, they kicked them and beat them with riot sticks,” he told Primera Hora, one of the leading San Juan daily newspapers. The president of the FCT (Central Labor Federation) Luisa Acevedo was beaten in the back, and José Rodríguez Báez, president of the FTPR, was also injured. Both were taken to the hospital, according to the UGT leader. Several demonstrators were arrested.

A student from the UPR Humanities Department, Mariana Lima, told our reporter: “We came here to demonstrate because the universities are closed in protest over privatization. Governor Fortuño held a tea party here in the Sheraton Hotel, charging $1,000 a plate. One thousand dollars is what my education costs, in a public university! They want to take away our scholarships. They beat us with riot clubs. They tear-gassed us. They sprayed pepper gas right in my face.”

An airport worker who is a member of the HEO (Brotherhood of Office Workers) of the port authority, Jesús, said: “We’re here because we’re fighting against privatization of the ports, of the UPR and the rest. We have to keep on fighting against these outrages by the police and the government.”

Gilberto, another port worker who handles heavy machinery, said: “The police provoked this incident and they were ruthless. We’re here partly because Law 7 affects us indirectly. We don’t want them to privatize us like they did with the Puerto Rican Telephone Company” (in 1998). We have to show that we are united, students and workers.”

(Law 7, introduced by the governor and rammed through the legislature last year, authorizes the government, in the name of the economic crisis, to lay off public employees despite union contracts. It also changed the financing formula for the University of Puerto Rico, leading to the budget deficit that is now being used to justify the elimination of tuition waivers and other measures against the students.)

Another student, from Social Sciences, said: “They were beating us with riot clubs, especially in the back, affecting people’s disks.” A Social Work student, Joel, who uses a wheel chair, gave a speech on the corner were a number of students and workers managed to regroup after the police assault. He said: “People should stay militant to the end. We have to keep on fighting. I’m glad we spoiled Fortuño’s party.”

At this moment (9 p.m.), there is a picket line in front of the main entrance to the UPR campus in Río Piedras (in metropolitan San Juan) where students and workers are chanting, “Struggle yes, sellout no!” They are also singing a famous anthem of the workers movement that goes back decades. Along with indignation, they are showing their determination to continue this fight, which is shaking up bourgeois public opinion as well as important sectors of the working class. It is this class that has the power to defeat the increasingly brazen and brutal attacks by the bourgeois government.

We must not allow the ruling class and its rabid guard dogs to attack labor leaders and student activists with impunity for coming out in defense of the struggle against privatization. The strike this Tuesday (May 18), where thousands of workers joined with students and professors in front of the Río Piedras campuses and at UPR campuses around the island, shows that the working class of this country is vitally interested in defending public education, along with the fight against layoffs, Law 7 and other attacks by the bourgeoisie. It is urgently necessary to carry out powerful strikes to shut down key sectors of the economy and to multiply solidarity protests internationally. ■






To contact the Internationalist Group and the League for the Fourth International, send e-mail to: [email protected]