Solidarity to Occupy Oakland General Strike

To the Occupy Oakland protesters:

We express our solidarity with the Oakland general strike on November 2 especially the blockade of the Port of Oakland. The general strike and port blockade will reveal the truth that the 99% creates the wealth that the 1% now monopolizes. Such forms of mass actions will also show the way forward for the occupy protest movement now surging in the US and other countries.

We likewise salute the Occupy Oakland protesters who bravely faced violent eviction last October 25 even as we condemn the police for their brutal attack.

The Philippine Airlines Employees’ Association (PALEA), the union of the ground staff of Philippine Airlines, and Partido ng Manggagawa (Labor Party-Philippines), the independent party of the working class in the Philippines, stand shoulder to shoulder with the Occupy Oakland protesters. We too struggle against corporate greed and capitalist globalization with its destructive impact on the workers and the youth. Truly the movement against corporate greed and capitalist globalization is international in scope.

More than a thousand PALEA members are presently occupying areas outside the international airports of Manila and Cebu, the two biggest cities in the Philippines, for a month now since the company locked out and terminated some 2,400 employees. The layoffs are part of an outsourcing scheme that aimed to downgrade us into contract workers which we have been fighting against for the last two years.

Two weeks ago a court sheriff accompanied by hired goons of the company attempted to disperse the picketline in Manila. The resistance of PALEA members forced them to retreat. And then last Saturday, scores of hired goons launched a daybreak attack on PALEA’s occupation camp while many, including women and children, were still asleep. Half of the campout was destroyed and several protesters were hurt but the dispersal attempt masterminding by the company was repelled. In less than a day the occupation camp was wholly rebuilt.

We have vowed to defend our occupation. PALEA’s struggle is inspired by the Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Oakland protests and our fight is part of the global movement against corporate greed and capitalist globalization.

On November 2, PALEA and its supporters started a three-day “long march” around several cities to bring the campaign against corporate greed and capitalist globalization to the working class communities and areas. The Oakland general strike and port blockade will be an inspiration to our “long march” protest.