The president of the union representing banana workers in Honduras said Tuesday his union will investigate Enquirer findings that Chiquita Brands International Inc. set up secretly controlled companies in Honduras to undermine union membership and pay lower wages. In separate actions, representatives of Costa Rica and France said their governments have begun looking into findings contained in an Enquirer report that was published Sunday.
Additionally, the director of a coordinating group for all of Central America's banana unions said he was calling on the Honduran government to investigate Chiquita's secret business practices "that have now been exposed by The Cincinnati Enquirer."
The new calls for investigations of Chiquita echo that of European Parliament member Glenys Kinnock. Mrs. Kinnock, a member of the European Parliament from Wales, on Monday called on the European Union commission to investigate Chiquita.
On Sunday, the Enquirer published an 18-page section detailing questionable business practices of Cincinnati-based Chiquita. Those included secret control of supposedly independent banana companies, the cover-up of a bribe in Colombia and the buying of political influence with campaign contributions.
Chiquita has challenged the Enquirer findings, saying the reports were based on "selective editing" and were "inaccurate and misleading."
The government and union officials made their statements while attending the International Banana Conference, a gathering of banana producers, environmentalists, governments and union groups concerned about problems in the industry. The three-day gathering in Brussels, capital of the EU, has drawn more than 300 delegates from 44 countries to discuss issues from pesticide use, to market protections, to corporate codes of conduct.
Chiquita and the U.S. trade representative's office have not attended the conference despite being invited. Ralph Ives, deputy assistant U.S. trade representative and the administration's point man on banana policy, said he was not attending because of a scheduling conflict.
"There will be a major reaction to this," said Juan Funes Estrada, 40, president of Sindicato de Trabajadores de la Tela Railroad Company (SITRATERCO), the union representing Chiquita workers in Honduras. The Tela Railroad Co. is Chiquita's main subsidiary in Honduras, though the company is incorporated in Delaware. The union is the largest in Honduras and one of the largest in Central America, with 5,600 members.
"We have always suspected that the company wasn't being fair with us, but now we have the confirmation," Mr. Funes said, speaking through a translator. He was referring to Chiquita documents and quotes from Chiquita officials in internal voice-mail messages that were provided to the Enquirer by a confidential source.
German Edgardo Zepeda, director of Coordinadora de Sindicatos Bananeros de Honduras (COSIBAH), a coordinating group for all of Central America's banana unions, said that the Honduran government will have to take some kind of action on the Enquirer findings. He said his organization will demand investigations by the Honduran government.
"The government is bound to react," he said through a translator. "It has to clarify these issues to get to the bottom of this."
Meanwhile, a Costa Rican delegate here said his government is going to review the Enquirer findings as well.
Carlos Rojas, a member of the Costa Rican delegation and a former minister of agriculture, said he did not want to comment yet on the Enquirer stories until the review is concluded.
Jean Louis Bonicel, who heads the agricultural department for the French government's Ministry of Overseas Territories, said his office had also begun a review of the findings.
The French government has long opposed U.S. efforts on behalf of Chiquita to overturn European trade protections. These protections benefit small banana growers in Africa and the Caribbean, but hurt Chiquita, which is Europe's largest importer.
Chiquita officials did not respond to Enquirer requests for comment Tuesday.
According to the Enquirer report, Chiquita set up structures to avoid the restrictions of Honduran land ownership and national security laws as well as to limit or eliminate unions on its plantations.
This system included trusts being set up in the Channel Islands and Liechtenstein, two well-known European tax and trust havens, and in Honduras with the involvement of large Honduran banks.
Another form of control was the formation of farm companies involving five trusted Honduran citizens with ties to Chiquita
subsidiaries. These Honduran citizens were made shareholders of the farm companies. But once those companies were established and shares issued, the shares were signed in blank and then given to Chiquita.
Chiquita has used similar legal structures in other Latin American countries, including Colombia and Guatemala.
One company involved in these schemes was Compania Bananera Limitada S.A., (COBALISA) which is based in La Lima, Honduras, headquarters of Chiquita's Honduran banana operations.
"The truth is, we didn't know about COBALISA," said Mr. Funes, who also lives in La Lima. "We knew it existed as a company, but (COBALISA officials) kept it very secret and said they were independent and said they had nothing to do with Chiquita."
Mr. Funes said he thinks Tela may have violated its contract with the union. "I plan to discuss this with my board as soon as I get back (to Honduras)," he said.
Mr. Funes said SITRATERCO could take several actions, including calling for national strikes, lawsuits or public campaigns with the help of other unions around the world.
He said the union, if it determines the Enquirer findings are true, will lodge a complaint with the United Nations and the International Labor Organization (ILO), a world body dealing with employees' rights.
He also said the issues will be raised at the union's contract negotiations with Tela, set for August.
Mr. Funes said Tela had launched a program several years ago with the slogan that translates from Spanish, "Together is Better," a plan that is supposed to promote company - union cooperation.
These latest findings, he said, make it clear Tela and Chiquita are not interested in doing anything "together with the union."
"We don't trust them at all," he said.
(Copyright 1998)
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