Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
of their own. The Comité Coordinador Obrero (Workers' Coordinating
Committee, CCO) formed in 1950 with the intention of organizing Hon-
duranmining,factory,andagriculturalworkers.TheCCO,alongwiththe
PartidoDemocráticoRevolucionarioHondureño(PDRH)beganpublish-
ing underground newspapers that circulated widelyon the North Coast.
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In April 1954, Tela Railroad Company dock workers walked off the job
after the company refused to pay them overtime for working on Easter
Sunday (as stipulated by Gálvez's reform legislation). Shortly thereafter,
nurses and other employees of the company's hospital in Tela presented
management with a list of demands that the two sides swiftly resolved. A
few days later, dock workers, machinists, and other company employees
went on strike in Puerto Cortés. When police authorities detained a pair
of strike leaders, a mass protest by workers succeeded in winning their
unconditional release. May Day celebrations in El Progreso and La Lima
drew several thousand people who turned out to express their support
for the striking dock workers. Two days later, the entire work force of the
Tela Railroad Company's El Progreso division walked off the job. They
were soon joined by thousands of coworkers in La Lima, Puerto Cortés,
and Tela. Within a week, some 15,000 Standard Fruit Company laborers
alsowent on strike. For the first time since 1932, a general strike paralyzed
export banana production on the North Coast.
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The striking United Fruit workers demanded wage increases, im-
proved medical care, paid vacation time, housing for all workers, free
schooling for employees' children, and the provision of protective work
clothing, among other things. Standard Fruit's employees sought the im-
mediatedismissalofthreecompanyadministrators,afiftypercent,across-
the-board wage hike, paid vacations, and other benefits. A government-
appointed mediator succeeded in bringing the Standard Fruit strike to
a relatively swift conclusion when the company consented to both make
modest wage increases and replace the three administrators named in
the strikers' petition. However, some workers rejected the settlement and
remained on strike until the government intervened. The Tela Railroad
Company strike lasted sixty-nine days before the two sides reached an
agreement following the intervention of President Gálvez, the develop-
ment of deep fissures among theworkers' leaders, and the U.S.-supported
arrest of strike organizers with ties to communist organizations and the
PDRH. Workers won modest increases in wages and benefits. More im-
portantly, the Tela Railroad Company agreed to recognize collective bar-
gaining units. Shortly thereafter, labor leaders created the Tela Railroad
Company Workers' Union (SITRATERCO).
