Zumosol workers win their first legal battle: "David has defeated Goliath"

• Protests Tired of being the 'cousins' of Zumosol: the struggle of 38 workers "abandoned and abandoned by the institutions"

"It is the first battle of many that has to come against a multinational and we have seen that the union of the workers can win them.

", admits Fernando Trujillo, a worker at the

factory in Palma del Río (Córdoba), in a conversation with this newspaper.

After almost eight months locked up in the facilities of this juice factory, the

on July 26 recognized that the company's second ERTE was illegal, and that the 38 employees in an uncertain employment situation should be paid for six months of payroll they claimed.

Zumosol was born within the Pascual group.

Today it belongs to Zumos Palma, SL, whose factory is located in the Cordoba town of Palma del Río.

Since 2013, this company has been part of the Turkish investment group Toksöz Grup Sanovel.

Toksöz, after presenting a first ERTE, was looking for a buyer for the facilities.

Central Andalusian Management and Plastic Supplies, SL (Cegeplás) acquired the factory.

So, the 38 workers of Zumos Palma would be employees of Cegeplás.

"Yes, they say they have sold it. But there is no contract that they have sold it. What happens is that 19 days after this supposed sale, the buyer, Cegeplás, unilaterally breaks the contract, and there they are in the Zumos Palma says that

Cegeplás

.

But this is a legal trick that has been invented to liquidate the workers and not pay us compensation.

We about Cegeplás do not sue or do anything because it is a company that does not exist, it was dead since 2015, it had no activity.

It is a company that is dedicated to the management of plastic that has nothing to do with our history," explains Trujillo.

The judgment of the Supreme Court is final and ratifies what the ruling of the Superior Court of Justice of Andalusia issued on November 18, 2021: that

.

Specifically, the period from April 15 to October 14, 2021. The sentence was not final, so the company appealed it.

"He forces him to pay us and they lose a deposit they had made. The truth is that it

and the first battle we won in our war," interjects the worker.

Workers camped at the Zumosol facilities. Gogo LobatoEL MUNDO

The next conquest for this group will be for the judge to rule that they have been fired and forcing the company to compensate them according to the seniority of each worker.

"Right now we are not registered with any company, nor have we been fired, we are in a legal vacuum," Trujillo denounces.

In fact, several appointments with the Justice are pending.

"We are waiting for the main trials, none of which have been held yet. We thought that a single trial would be held for the 38 workers, but from what we are seeing, the Justice has determined that it will be done by groups. The first trials For those who had given a date, it was for four colleagues that was set for last April, what happens is that they delayed it to June, in June they have delayed it again to mid-September and the last date we have is that. It is not known if it will finally be held or if it will be delayed again", he comments.

In this fight, the workers do not ignore the moral exhaustion.

"Psychologically we are all defeated, our families too. We are already tired. We started very cold and rainy and now we are at the other extreme, with temperatures reaching 42 degrees on some days. There we are in a car park under a metal sheet. .. you can imagine the conditions we are in. We try to lead a normal life, we do rotating shifts so as not to be there for a long time and that there are no problems with heat stroke and others, but

, "he admits Trujillo.

The day-to-day life of this group is complicated, but at least their support is guaranteed for a few more months: "Thanks to a letter we sent to the Labor Inspectorate in which we requested that an inspector come to verify that no one was working here, that report was made, and thanks to that report we were able to access unemployment benefit. We are currently in a somewhat surreal situation, because what the Labor Inspectorate has done is declare a tacit dismissal so that we can collect unemployment. Officially we have not been dismissed but we collect the benefit", explains the Zumosol worker.

In this way, they could collect the benefit until January 2023.

because those six months have been computed as unemployment, and now since it has been illegal and the company has to pay us our payroll, we add another six months with the right to benefit". The aid would then be extended until June 2023.

FAVOR WIND

Despite the emotional blow of living in tents for so long to claim their labor rights, Fernando Trujillo acknowledges that both he and his colleagues are beginning to receive "good news."

"The Civil Guard opened an investigation since January and has passed a fairly extensive report to the judge, the judge already has it in his possession, and that already opens criminal proceedings. We are no longer just talking about financial compensation.

.

The Attorney General's Office has also opened its own investigation.

The Labor Inspection has published a letter in which it says that the first subrogation of Zumos Palma and Cegeplás has never existed, so this implies that we are still workers of Zumos Palma.

And with all these grains of sand, we are seeing that we are already optimistic for a possible sentence, because all this influences the possible sentence of the judge, "he admits.

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