Originally posted by
[email protected] 31, 2007 06:19 pm
With one company I know, (which also claimed to be "worker-run") there were shareholders who got money for investing capital, but there were also new employees working at even below minimum wage (because it was a special re-employment program) who were not entitled to shares or voting. I hope I don't have to explain to anybody here how this should be different from workers' self-management under libertarian communism, anarcho-communism or anarcho-syndicalism. But while I would hope activists understand this, it turns out that some workers are rather thinking of self-managed capitalism, where they get ownership benefits from working - a sort of human capital - which later they cash in on, including through sale of this capital.
Unfortunately, of course there are workers in Jugoremedija that also think how to benefit from their ownership. How many of them I don`t know. But we see in that just a coincidental result of whole situation when workers didn’t had any other option except to take over their factory claiming their owners` rights.
So again, maybe you see in them small shareholders but we see in them hungry workers without job. Your questions seems so far away in a situation where they have to fight to save the factory from bankruptcy, from state which wants to put it on the market, and when they fight with workers of other factories from Zrenjanin city for those workers` working places.
Ok, what is important here for us. During the election campaigns of actual neoliberal political elite when Milosevic was in power, part of their campaign for the privatization of companies was humiliating workers and their ability to self-manage factories. They were saying that most of the factories went into bankruptcy because ``stupid`` workers couldn’t manage them. In reality factories were managed by members of communist’s party that easily transformed themselves into new neoliberal elite. So responsibility for factories` bankruptcy is theirs and not workers`.
Neoliberal elite in power forced Jugoremedija in bankruptcy saying that even bad privatization is better than to leave factory to ``stupid`` workers.
But the workers after reclaiming their factory took factory out of the bankruptcy. So in Serbia Jugoremedija is an important example that workers can manage their factory. After decade of campaign against workers` abilities it is very important for us so we can have something familiar to people to point our fingers when we talk against private property and for workers` management. Jugoremedija is now almost the only factory in Zrenjanin city that is working and giving salaries to the workers. There are some 2.500 workers without job. So workers from Jugoremedija inspired and organised workers of ``Bek`` and ``Shinvoz`` also from Zrenjanin to block their factories which were led to bankruptcy and to request abrogation of privatization contract.
Why is that the ``most progressive fight`` in Serbia for us? Well, because it is almost the only fight and if there is any fight else it is organized by these workers.
One more reason why we also support these workers is because there are some Serbian wealthy ``revolutionaries``, anarchists and syndicalist fighting for the big owners that want to buy whole Serbian pharmaceutical industry (Jugoremedija is pharmaceutical factory) and then to sell it expensively to multinational corporation. That is the reason for their defamation and for their call not to support these workers because they are not ``revolutionary`` enough. Like it means that you are revolutionary when you bullshit to people from your bourgeois villa your daddy bought it to you and when you do nothing else.
1. What is the exact ratio of worker-held shares to shares held by management and ouside investors?
Ok, I`ll tell you what I know… and I`ll look for the information I don’t have.
Almost all shareholders except the state are at the same time workers or they were workers of Jugoremedija at one point in their life. If there are any shareholders except workers that is not mistake of these workers but inherited situation. Workers elected management among them and people from management don’t posses extra shares except those as workers.
Their persistence in the battle for factory comes from the fact that they are workers of that factory and not because of the fact that they are owners of the factory. All of them were initially fighting for their job, against dismissal, against selling the factory property and against factory bankruptcy. And in one point they realized that even by law they couldn’t be fired because they are legally owners of that factory. Ok, they maybe received those shares during the first privatization law in Serbia and it was Milosevic`s law which was by some ``experts`` entitled as ``covered up self-management`` and those ``experts`` also said that that privatization actually was not real privatization. So new political elite (neoliberal) didn’t want to recognize in reality that first privatization law is valid. But of course workers did want to recognize it as valid. And that law gave 70% of factory shares to workers and 30% belonged to the state. After fall of Milosevic new privatization law gave 30% shares to the workers and 70% state was selling to capitalists by tenders, auctions, etc.
I don`t know how state had 42% of shares to sell it on the auction to a criminal Jovica Stefanovic Nini wanted by the Interpol at that time. There was a contract between the state and J.S. Nini that he has to buy the shares that he lacks (that right state also sold to him although didn’t had that right) and to become the major owner of the factory. I think that he didn’t do that but in spite of that he acted as major owner because state helped him to declare himself as a major owner and nobody said nothing against. Or he did transaction of 20% of company debt in shares and on that illegal way became major owner. Workers were also confused at the start. They started opposing to new owner J.S.Nini when they saw that he bought factory just to sell factory machines and resources and all of that led factory to bankruptcy. And state helped J.S. Nini to kick out of the factory 140 workers opposing (which were also as workers owners –small shareholders- of the factory but in Serbia like you see that doesn’t mean anything).
So after the legal battle and winning through abrogation of privatization contract workers reclaimed their 58% of the factory and they became major owners. The rest of the shares belong to the state. State puts pressure on actual management of the factory to put Jugoremedija on the market so she could sell here 42% shares.
2. Are all workers given an equal amount of shares for free or can workers aquire additional shares? Are workers forced to take loans to pay for their shares?
Workers are not paying for their shares. I think that according to years spend in factory they received shares. Retired people still alive also received some shares according to the law.
3. Are there any workers that are not shareholders?
Well, maybe new employed workers are not shareholders but new worker’s management is exploring the ways to transform them in shareholders after few years spend in factory. Jugoremedija is under workers` management only for 7 months until now.
4. If a worker quits or retires, do they retain shares? If a new person is hired, do they become a shareholder, do they have to work to get shares or must they purchase shares? Or are they simple wage labourers?
According to law worker retain shares.
5. Is a worker obliged to maintain his or her shares while working or can they sell them on the open market?
Most of the workers and their actual management induce workers not to sell their shares so workers could keep their 58% and keep the factory under workers` control. Jugoremedija is still not on the open market. They forced the government to postpone their coming out on market for one year or more but the law forced them to do that after.
6. How exactly is the factory run? In most "worker-shareholder" situations, a management board is still in place. In places where workers are not a majority, usually you get a worker representative on a supervisory board. How exactly is the structure to look?
Jugoremedija is permitted by law to have management board. There is also supervisory board. In both boards are only workers of the factory. Maybe state has somebody in supervisory board but that is irrelevant.
7. What is the decision-making process like?
There are workers-shareholders councils. I am not sure for the rest. I`ll ask