After being sent to forced leave and additionally granted a paid absence, the FCA workers are back at their work places in Kragujevac producing the planned number of FIAT 500L. In the company trade union organisation (affiliated to the CATUS) we were told that in the months to come two shifts should produce 209 cars a day.
Union President Markovic told us that last year was “terrible” as there were many non-working days, plus 132 days of a paid leave, vacations and state holidays. Markovic was the leader of the big strike in 2018 and later appeared at the session of the European Parliament organized by the European United Left/Nordik Green Left to speak about it.
“We hope we’ll have our place within the 2020 global restructuring of the company, work more and finally witness the start of a new FCA model production”, said Markovic in an interview delivered to the press. He concluded by saying that” in 2019 workers’ hopes, unfortunately, did not come true”.
FCA arrived to Serbia with great promises and was largely assisted by the government which was hopeful of new quality jobs and more budget contributions. However, a simple review of the company production shows that in 2019 it was far under the optimum level of 150,000 vehicles a year.
