A change of the controlling faction of the Chunghwa Telecommunic-ation Workers' Union, Taiwan's biggest trade union, may be a bodyblow to Taiwan's independent labor movement labor activists and scholars fear.
In the election of representatives for the union which finished Friday, current union leaders failing to gain a controlling number of seats.
It is possible that the labor faction which is currently dominant may lose their control of the union in the next stage of the election process, which is the vote for the union president.
This might cause serious political repercussions in the near future.
The union elections of two other state-owned enterprises in mid-January -- Chinese Petroleum Corporation and Taiwan Power Corporation -- might also be affected.
The result is that state-owned enterprises might speed up privatization procedures, said Kuo Kuo-wen (郭國文), secretary general of Taiwan Labor Group, a labor activist group.
In the vote held in the past two days, the current union leaders won 55 seats, against 68 won by the allegedly management-supported faction, called I Love Chunghwa Telecom Alliance, according to current union leaders. Two seats were taken by non-faction representatives.
The assembly will meet in three weeks to elect directors and members of the executive committee, who will then elect the new union president.
The position of the current president, Chang Shu-chung (張緒中), who came to public attention through the organization of large demonstrations, might not be secure.
"This is indeed a frustration to our efforts over the last three years," Chang said.
According to Liu Chin-hsin (劉進興), a professor at National Taiwan University of Science and Technology and a long-time labor movement watcher, Chang changed the Chunghwa Telecom union from a rubber stamp into an independent labor organization over the past three years.
"[The Chunghwa Telecom union] is now the engine of Taiwan's labor movement," Liu said.
But Liu remains worried that the democratic union that has been established might regress if control passes to KMT-supported representatives.
Months before the election, the current union claimed both the management of Chunghwa Telecom and the KMT had intervened in the election campaign through the mobilization of administrative resources.
According to Chiu Yu-bin (邱毓斌), secretary-general of the union, Minister of Transportation Lin Feng-cheng (林豐正), at a meeting of the telecommunication branch of the KMT held on April 20, allegedly ordered executives of Chunghwa Telecom management to intervene in the election. Lin denied such claims.
Last Thursday, when the union commenced its election, the cabinet-level Council of Labor Affairs sent a notification to the Chunghwa Telecommunication Corporation, saying the management had intervened improperly, and urged the management to respect the autonomy of the union, lest there should be further disputes.
But such a move had little impact on the election result. According to Chang Hsu-chung, enormous resources were deployed by the management of the company.
The union of Chunghwa Telecom has 35,000 members. In June, under Chang's leadership, the union allied with another 14 trade unions of public enterprises and formed the Grand Alliance of State-owned Enterprises of Workers' Unions (公營事業工會大聯盟), with a total membership of 160,000 members.
That explains why the KMT and the management have tried every way they could to regain control of the union, said Chang.
"This is a figure [the alliances' membership] that appeals to any presidential candidate," Chang said.
Protesting against privatization is one of the major missions of Chunghwa Telecom union. But despite considerable activism, the cabinet in October decided that the company has to privatize by June 2001.
According to Chang, under pressure from the union, the government has set up a preferred stock mechanism (黃金股機制) and a public share management regulation (公股管理辦法) procedure, which are designed to ensure the company's operation would not be abused after privatization.
"The more we do, the more politicians are forced to respond. And if they don't respond, they will get fewer votes," Chang said.
Chang's biggest achievement has been in labor education and organization, said Kuo. Besides, Kuo said Chang had been actively joining local social activist groups and overseas telecommunication unions, making Chunghwa Telecom no longer a closed and self-oriented union only concerned with the benefits of its own members.
Kuo worries that this work might not be continued once the control of the union is lost to KMT backed representatives.
The speed of privatization might be accelerated and there might be less room for union lobbying, he said.
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