MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Uruguayan banks and transport announce 24-hour strike for when?

The proposed reforms are “a mere patch that the new technological realities and the labor world will make obsolete in a very short time,” AEBU argues

Uruguayan public transport drivers and bank clerks will stage a 24-hour nationwide strike to protest against President Luis Lacalle Pou's attempt to reform the country's pension system and increase the retirement age, which is causing concern, particularly when such a move was something the head of state had vowed during his campaign that he would not seek.

Through a communiqué released Friday, the National Union of Transport Workers (UNOTT) expressed its “total rejection of the retirement reform project” and resolved “to maintain the strategy proposed, calling for a 24-hour general strike of transport at national level on April 25.”

The measure had already been announced last month and it was scheduled for the same day the Lower House will begin the norm's parliamentary debate.

A similar measure will be staged by the Central Council of the Association of Bankers of Uruguay. “In rejection of this social security reform and in defense of our Caja Bancaria. Because another reform is possible,” begins the communiqué of the AEBU union in its call for a 24-hour work stoppage.

The labor grouping argues that “two out of every three workers will have losses in their retirement or pensions” and that “the increase in the retirement age will have an impact on employment, both among the young and the elderly.”

Deputies from all over the country are voting, without information or study, on a project with important modifications that define the future of pensions and rights of Uruguayans, the AEBU union insisted.

The postponement of retirement ages will lead to a deterioration in the quality of life of large sectors of workers exposed to physical or psychological demands at work, the group also pointed out in a statement.

Women workers will see the gender gap that exists today in the labor market deepen and will have more difficulties, it went on.

If this reform is passed, workers will contribute 39 more salaries to the system without any improvement in their pensions, the document added.

It also highlighted that the proposed reform was being discussed without any information on the consequences it would entail and it would result in “a mere patch that the new technological realities and the labor world will make obsolete in a very short time.”