2023-10-04 05:01:00
The subway and train workers of San Pablo, the most populated city in South America, called this Tuesday for a strike against the privatization agenda of Governor Tarcisio de Freitas, one of the main allies of former President Jair Bolsonaro. The strike, initially lasting 24 hours, totally or partially paralyzed the service on four subway lines and five train lines, which connect the metropolitan region with the center of São Paulo.
Against the privatization wave
The employees of the Basic Sanitation Company of the State of São Paulo, the largest public water company in Latin America that supplies almost 30 million people, also joined the strike. Unions denounce that transferring control of public power to the private sector will increase rates and worsen the quality of services. They also call for a plebiscite to decide on the privatizations planned by the São Paulo government.
At the request of the São Paulo government, labor justice forced train workers to provide essential services during rush hour. The union accepted but made it a condition to offer the service free of charge, something that was not accepted by the government authorities. The bus and bus transportation service operated normally in San Pablo because they depend on the municipality and not the state government.
At the Barra Funda terminal, where it is possible to board train, bus and subway lines, leaders of movements that support the strike organized to explain to the population what privatization means and inform the reasons for the strike. The subway in that terminal alone transports, on average, around 60 thousand passengers per hour during peak hours.
Raquel Brito, a member of the left-wing Popular Unity party and a participant in the call, assured the Agencia Brasil news agency: “Public companies are assets. Privatization is very bad even for users. Private companies aim to make profits and that “The service worsens and increases rates. The strike is a historical instrument of struggle and all that was obtained through it were rights.”
The state government defends itself
The local authorities of San Pablo, a city whose population amounts to 12 million people, sought to mitigate the disruption caused by the strike by reinforcing the operation of the bus lines, which operated normally.
Governor Tarcisio de Freitas stated this Tuesday in a press conference that the strike is “illegal, abusive and clearly political” and insisted that he will continue with his privatization agenda. “We are doing what we said we were going to do during the campaign: starting studies to verify financial viability and see if we can provide a better service” and “recover investment capacity,” he declared.
The São Paulo governor, who was Minister of Infrastructure during the Bolsonaro administration (2019-2022), also accused the strikers of failing to comply with the minimum services decreed by justice. “They are not respecting the citizen and whoever does not respect the citizen or the judiciary, who are they going to respect?” He criticized.
This is the second strike by railway workers that Tarcisio de Freitas has faced since taking office as governor of São Paulo. The first took place last March, when the main union in the category demanded salary improvements and new hires.
In the state of São Paulo, a new source of conflict emerged this Tuesday with the strike of the workers of the third largest aviation company in the world, Embraer, located in the municipality of Sao José dos Campos. The workers denounce that the company reduced the benefits for the career project and retirement system within the company and they want salary increases greater than the four percent offered by the employers.
Added to this transportation strike is a strike that has already been going on for ten days by professors and students at the University of San Pablo, the most prestigious in the country and one of the main ones in Latin America, because the rectorate (which depends on funds of the São Paulo government) suspended competitions to hire teachers in the fields of philosophy, engineering, performing arts, cinema and literature, leaving the budget unexecuted.
In political terms, these measures of force are a test for Governor Freitas and his political alliances in the face of the 2026 presidential elections, in which he appears as one of the leaders of the right and extreme right to confront President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, in case he seeks re-election.
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