Within an hour, hundreds of people from around the city--other workers and members of the unemployed organizations, popular assemblies, and radical political parties in the workers movement--had responded to an appeal for help and poured into the street in front of the plant, denouncing the cop action. Later that morning, the same judge who had issued the eviction notice ordered the cops to withdraw. Chanting "Brukman belongs to the workers," the garment workers re-occupied the building and by the next day had resumed production.

Brukman remains a focal point of labor resistance in Argentina. In July this reporter interviewed workers at the plant who described how in December 2001 the sewers, mostly women, occupied the plant to oppose the bosses’ plans to close the facility and lay them off, and to demand payment of back wages.

In face of the employers’ bankruptcy claims, the workers are demanding the Argentine government take over the factory to guarantee their jobs and wages. They have been running the plant themselves, producing high-quality men’s suits. Large banners draped over the front of the six-story building declare, "Jobs for all: not one more unemployed person" and "Workers at Brukman fight for nationalization under workers control."

Argentina remains in a state of economic collapse, with the burden falling hardest on workers and farmers. On November 14, the country’s government, running low on reserves, defaulted on an $805 million loan repayment to the World Bank, saying it would resume payments when the International Monetary Fund (IMF) agreed to restore a credit line. The decision makes Argentina ineligible for any new lending from the bank.

The IMF cut off loans to Argentina at the end of last year after the government was unable to keep up its debt payments. The economic crisis precipitated an explosion of antigovernment demonstrations, forcing the resignation of President Fernando de la Rúa. The government defaulted on Argentina’s record $141 billion debt to international investors.

In January, a new president appointed by Congress, Peronist Eduardo Duhalde, devalued the national currency, the peso, leading to a jump in prices of food and other necessities and a drastic cut in living standards for millions. The imperialist creditors continue to press the government to carry out brutal austerity measures that will squeeze working people even further.

A wave of bankruptcies and layoffs has swept the country. In the impoverished northern provinces, infant malnutrition is rearing its head. Argentine workers, who for decades had higher living standards than other parts of Latin America, are stunned to see photos of skeleton-like children in Tucumán province and other rural areas.

Protests by workers and other sections of the population against the effects of the economic crisis continue to seethe on a daily basis. Some 10,000 unemployed and retired workers marched through Buenos Aires November 7 to demand jobs and unemployment pay. The official jobless rate has jumped above 21 percent.

By standing up to the bosses and government, the workers at Brukman have become heroes in the eyes of many working people throughout Argentina. The employers have been looking for a way to get rid of this "bad" example. On March 16, at the request of the owners of Brukman, a judge ordered the police to evict the workers. The cops broke into the premises but were forced to withdraw in face of an outpouring of support from other workers.  
 
‘If they touch one, they touch us all’
This time they tried again. In a press statement headlined "If they touch one of us they touch us all," the Brukman workers reported that at 6:00 a.m. on November 24, some 200 federal and city cops, including a specialized unit called the Hawks, accompanied by fire trucks and water cannon, surrounded the plant. There were only six workers in the plant, doing guard duty. The cops raided the plant, beating and arresting those inside, while breaking computers and machinery and taking company documents. They accused the workers of "usurping" the factory.

An individual arriving to relieve her co-workers saw the police operation and spread the word to workers’ and other organizations. Hundreds of workers rushed to the scene, including those engaged in struggle from Pepsico, rail workers, telephone workers, organizations of unemployed workers, members of neighborhood assemblies, university students, and the human rights group Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, as well as members of left-wing parties.

"I received a phone call in the morning," said Leo Norniella, a worker from the Pepsico snacks plant, in a November 24 phone interview. "When I got there the street was full of people denouncing the police. The cops were already pulling out--the judge had decided to withdraw his eviction order--and the workers took back the plant. We held a rally that afternoon of 600 people, where the workers condemned the brutal treatment by the police."

He said the workers called a protest rally for November 26 and a march the following day.

The workers at Pepsico, on the outskirts of Buenos Aires, have been waging a fight of their own against arbitrary firings. Norniella, a shop steward who had been suspended because of his support to fired workers, recently won his job back.

The workers at Brukman have received support from others conducting plant occupations, from the Chilavert printing plant to the Panificación Cinco bakery. Above all they have forged ties with workers at the Zanón ceramic tile factory in the southwestern province of Neuquén, who are waging a similar fight.

A group of Zanón workers who were in Buenos Aires at the time were among the first to respond to the appeal for help when the police raided the plant. In Neuquén they have launched a campaign in solidarity with their sisters at Brukman. "We unconditionally defend our brothers and sisters at Brukman who are defending their inalienable right to a job," said the Zanón workers in a November 25 statement. "We continue to demand the expropriation of the factory and nationalization under workers control, just like Zanón."  
 
 
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