“Mea Fault” of former Tubacex President: Hurts Workers
- Álvaro Videgain had to stop being Tubacex’s president by his 70s, and after nearly 30 years at the head of the company, he made his last greeting in an interview with Vocento. His greatest self-criticism has been too good with the workers.
Tubacex workers are on the doorstep of the 140th strike and in recent months they have been involved in a strong whirlpool. The latter has been the shareholder board in which Álvaro Videgain left the presidency almost 30 years after he turned 70. The man will not leave the company, as he will be in charge of the Tubacex Foundation of which he owns.
However, the Vocento group conducted a friendly interview and published it on Sunday. Videgain did not miss the opportunity to repeat what was said at the shareholders’ meeting and explain his views on it. The opinion of the former president is very clear: Tubacex was in a hurry in 1992, but thanks to the sacrifices of management (redundancies of 300 workers) and the contribution of investors, it has become a leading company. In this upward trend, everything has been possible thanks to him and his team, and the only stumbling blocks have been the unions. Workers, in themselves, are never mentioned as active subjects, but always as passive “oompa-loompa”: or they are instruments of the management or victims of the unions.
Redundancies not related to COVID-19 or oil
About the ongoing conflict, Videgain hasn’t even concealed during the interview. In no case did he mention the alleged decarbonisation of the economy, renewable energies or the decline in oil, among other things. It has not lost time in incredible excuses and has directly clarified what is at the heart of the Tubacex shock; the need to reduce staff costs so that investors (shareholders) can get more money in the name of competitiveness.
And this is recognized by the journalist when he reminds him that the wages of the workers have been approved by the management itself. That’s the question where Videgain’s only self-criticism appears: “I recognize that we have made mistakes in some decisions, prioritizing staying in the active company, rather than staying on a strike.”
After all, the only mistake of the former president in Tubacex was generosity towards the workers. However, it does not mention that in 2019 two workers died at the plants of Aiaraldea and that they have not been the only ones in the twenty-first century. In any case, the workers here have been much better treated than those in Austria or the United States, because they are closer, or at least that believes Videgain.
No mention of the trial
Vocento’s journalist, as could not be otherwise, did not mention Videgain in an interview the trials between Tubacex and the unions, in which the management refused, on a proposal from the judges, to suspend the dismissals and to take other measures agreed with the workers’ representatives.
Thus, the former president has disseminated the company’s version of the current strike: The unions have not wanted to negotiate, have hijacked the workers and are not allowed to vote, and the management has always been and is ready to negotiate. Videgain does not mention that the loss of rights on the part of workers has been the starting point of their negotiation, and from there they have always been willing to reach agreements.
In fact, in the cosmogony of Videgain, the unions are guilty of everything; in generating conflicts, there are no more companies in Aiaraldea and in the Basque Country in general, because investors do not want to enter that context.
Moreover, contrary to the fundamental logic of capitalism, Videgain says that trade unions seek particular benefits when seeking everyone’s favor in the company. Of course, when he says the common good, the former president refers to the goodness of all investors and not to the goodness of the workers.
Investors
In the world of Videgain, as has been said, demons are the unions, while investors are the angels. Every effort must be made to confine them. But the only investor he refers to in the dialogue explains better than what the essence of the conflict creates. According to the former president, the biggest triumph of the company was the conversion of José María Aristrain into a shareholder, founder of the company.
Videgain has forgotten to clarify that Aristrain had to pay a bond of EUR 750 million to stay on the street, as the prosecutor’s office has asked him for 64 years in jail and a fine of EUR 1.4 billion to hide EUR 200 million in Switzerland.
Precisely to satisfy the greed of such investors, according to Videgain, workers have to give up their rights in the face of the financial crisis.
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Tribute to entrepreneurs and capture
It is clear that Álvaro Videgain’s primary objective was to denounce in Vocento’s interview that the social function of entrepreneurs is not right in society, but in the end it falls into his trap extolling the economic arrollation.
In fact, when the journalist is critical of what the investors of the company Solarpack (taking advantage of the renewable energy bubble to sell their shares and make them disappear from the company), Videgain directs him and comments otherwise: that the investors played very well and that it was the result of a great effort.
With these models, it is no wonder what is happening in Tubacex.
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