Celebrating May Day, the workers holiday, around the world

by Daniel Villa

This article was reprinted from the May 15th, 1997 issue of the People's Weekly World. For subscription information see below. All rights reserved - may be used with PWW credits.

Despite being almost totally ignored by the corporate media, May 1, known as International Workers' Day or simply May Day, was celebrated by millions of workers around the world.

In Puerto Rico, 40,000 people participated in a labor-led march which had as its theme opposition to the government's plan to privatize the state-controlled telephone company. Federico Torres Montalvo, secretary general of the Puerto Rican Labor Central (CPT) which organized the activity, told the World the CPT has passed a resolution endorsing a general strike similar to the one organized in 1990 which paralyzed the country when the government tried to sell the telephone company. That action forced the government to back down.

In Cuba, some 1.3 million workers marched through the Plaza of the Revolution in celebrations dedicated to Ernesto "Che" Guevara on the 30th anniversary of his death.

For the third consecutive year more than 200,000 Mexican workers marched to the area known as el Zocalo in defiance of the official labor leadership which was hosting a small indoor rally for President Ernesto Zedillo. According to the Spanish-language television station, Univision, this year's activity was the largest ever and protested Zedillo's neoliberal economic policies.

In Chile, the president of the Central Workers Organization, Roberto Alarcon, delivered a message to thousands of workers in which he criticized the government for closing the Lota coal mines which will leave 1,300 workers unemployed. On April 24 the World Federation of Trade Unions released a statement calling for solidarity with the miners.

A march in Panama protested the military presence of the United States and the Panamanian government's privatization of public companies. Tens of thousands marched in Venezuela and thousands more in Ecuador and Spain.

More than 1.5 million trade unionists and Communists marched in Russia where some leaders proposed another nationwide strike. It is the second time this year that large numbers of people took to the streets protesting the policies of the Yeltsin government. More than a million people throughout Russia took to the streets on March 27 for a one-day general strike.

Germany's 11.7 percent unemployment rate - 18 percent in the east - was the focal point of over 100,000 workers marching there. Protesters also expressed their opposition to Neo-Nazi groups and clashes with those groups resulted in more than 380 arrests.

Similar numbers were mobilized for May Day marchers in South Korea, North Korea, Japan and Turkey.