DETROIT: PLANT CLOSINGS, LAYOFFS LOOM AT DAIMLERCHRYSLER
By Terri Kay
Detroit
DaimlerChrysler has launched a major restructuring of its
Chrysler subsidiary, headquartered in the suburbs of
Detroit.
Coming at the same time as a downturn in automobile sales,
this thinly disguised attempt to dismantle the former
Chrysler Corp. could have grave consequences for the almost
100,000 Chrysler workers. It portends a wave of massive
plant closings and layoffs that could eliminate tens of
thousands of jobs.
This would have devastating effects on the largely African
American city of Detroit, which is just beginning to recover
from Chrysler's last major restructuring in the early 1980s.
Then Chrysler eliminated 35,000 Detroit jobs in three years.
DaimlerChrysler remains the biggest employer within the city
of Detroit, and the biggest employer of African American
workers among the Big Three automakers.
DaimlerChrysler Chief Executive Officer Juergen Schrempp has
already called for renegotiating the Auto Workers contract
with concessions by the union.
'MERGER OF EQUALS' MYTH EXPLODED
In 1998 Daimler-Benz AG, based in Germany, bought out
Chrysler Corp. in the biggest industrial merger ever.
To get approval from the Federal Trade Commission and the
Securities Exchange Commission, and to mute opposition from
the Auto Workers and the public, Daimler-Benz promised that
this would be a "merger of equals."
It promised that Chrysler would continue to operate as a
semi-autonomous unit, that there would be no plant closings
and that the jobs of Chrysler workers would not be affected.
However, in a recent interview with the Financial Times,
Schrempp acknowledged that this "merger of equals" talk was
a public-relations ploy to ensure government approval for
the Chrysler buyout.
Six of the eight Chrysler representatives on the
DaimlerChrysler board of management have been removed.
Schremp recently fired the Chrylser division's second
president since the acquisition. He was replaced with two
Daimler officers.
Of course, these corporate executives were bought out with
golden parachutes amounting to hundreds of millions of
dollars.
Before its acquisition by Daimler-Benz, Chrysler was rated
the "leanest" of all automobile companies internationally.
Chrysler's former officers had already implemented job speed-
up, downsizing and outsourcing to non-union suppliers.
Chrysler built up a $9 billion reserve for future product
development on the backs of its workers through its "lean
production" techniques. Daimler has used this fund to
acquire a controlling interest in Mitsubishi, buy Detroit
Diesel, start a sizeable joint venture with Caterpillar, buy
into a more commercial truck venture and make many other
purchases.
FIGHT ANTI-GERMAN CHAUVINISM!
Some rank-and-file auto workers and supporters say it's time
to launch a campaign to demand that the government reopen
its investigation into the Daimler-Benz acquisition of
Chrysler, which was approved based on Daimler's fraudulent
promises. The government, they say, must impose an immediate
moratorium on all Chrysler plant closings and layoffs before
they occur.
Kirk Kerkorian, the billionaire who was Chrysler's biggest
shareholder before the acquisition and is still
DaimlerChrysler's third-biggest shareholder, has filed a
lawsuit to reverse the Daimler buyout of Chrysler. Like the
Chrylser executives, however, Kerkorian is only worried
about protecting his own billions.
Kerkorian is also trying to poison Chrysler workers with
anti-German chauvinism and blur the class question, as if he
were not just as ruthless as the Daimler bosses.
"Only the Chrysler workers can defend their jobs," said
Jerry Goldberg of the Detroit A Job Is A Right Campaign, a
group that has fought plant closings and layoffs since the
mid-1980s. "And they can only do it by building solidarity
with German auto workers and fighting chauvinism.
"The Chrysler workers must be independently represented in
any government investigation of the Daimler buyout,"
Goldberg said. "In fact, the workers should be made the
trustees to manage and control the company's assets and stop
Daimler's plundering."
To implement their legal right to control over the
corporation, and to guarantee that the plants are not sold
off and closed, "the workers must take action now," he said.
"Workers' control committees should be set up in each
Chrysler plant. The workers should prepare to seize the
plants and stop the sell-off of equipment to defend their
legal and property right to their jobs.
"There must be worker representatives on the DaimlerChrysler
board of management to replace the eight former Chrysler
executives who sold them out.
"Chrysler workers must solicit support from IG Metall, the
union representing Daimler workers in Germany. This union
has fought militantly against corporate downsizing and would
undoubtedly lend its solidarity to the Auto Workers union in
this battle."
Goldberg added: "Ultimately, only workers' control can
protect the jobs and interests of the DaimlerChrysler
workers. With a recession likely, a struggle by Chrysler
workers to protect their jobs now can set the tone for
working-class battles against plant and office closings and
layoffs that will inevitably affect millions of workers in
the next period."
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