• The measure of force began at 12 and will govern indefinitely. From Emova, the concessionaire company of the subway network, they repudiated all acts of violence but also criticized the measure of force adopted by the metro delegates.

The Union Association of Subway and Premetro Workers (AGTSyP) announced a total stoppage of subway line B for today starting at 12 noon, and for an indefinite period of time, as a result of the aggression that a worker would have suffered in the workshop Rancagua by a supervisor.

According to the metro delegates in a statement released on social networks, the “self-defense measure” was resolved by an episode of violence in the workshop located below Los Andes Park, in the Chacarita neighborhood of Buenos Aires. “The aggression is part of the crisis in the workshop due to the presence of asbestos, which prevents workers from carrying out tasks on certain parts and certain trains, given the prohibition that has existed in our country since 2001 to work on contact with that carcinogenic material. Despite the laws in force, the company exerts all kinds of pressure on workers in the sector so that they carry out tasks without the conditions to be carried out being given, ”the union warned.

Claudio Dellacarbonara, delegate of AGTSyP, spoke with Télam and ratified that the stoppage of the line that connects the stations of Leandro N. Alem and Juan Manuel de Rosas still has no completion time. “It could extend throughout the day and see how we carry on tomorrow. It is what we are discussing in an assembly”, he pointed out.

According to the Télam agency, in 2018 the AGTSyP denounced the presence of asbestos in trains and subway network facilities and assured that since then “67 workers have been affected and three colleagues have died.” In this sense, it was stated that “this true health crisis due to the presence of carcinogenic material in the subway network needs an urgent solution and this cannot be the persecution and aggression against workers that we demand a response to.”

“We already have a balance of several colleagues who have died from cancer caused by asbestos, in addition to dozens of colleagues whose lungs have been affected by this mineral that has been banned since the beginning of the century and yet has not been withdrawn from the network. We demand an immediate response to our claim and hold Emova and Sbase (Subterráneos de Buenos Aires) responsible for this situation”, concludes the union’s statement.

For its part, Emova, the concessionaire of the Buenos Aires subway network, issued a statement in response to the force measure decreed by the metro delegates. Although they reject and repudiate any type of violence, the authorities also expressed their annoyance at the stoppage of line B, considering that “there is no reason for these situations that occurred in the workplace to affect the subway service, and consequently the workers. users”.

They also reported that an internal investigation was opened to determine under what circumstances the “confusing episode” between a supervisor and a union delegate occurred.

The protest surprised the thousands of passengers who regularly use this means of public transport, and caused a logical outrage. “I’ll have to take a bus. I’m a tourist, so it doesn’t matter to me. I’m used to it, I lived 30 years here. In Argentina it is not new”, said a man in dialogue with A24, after encountering the closed access to the Chacarita station.

Meanwhile, a young woman who was on her way to school was resigned because she had to find another alternative to reach her destination. “I didn’t know about the strike. I have to go to school and I don’t know which one -collective- to take, “she lamented in statements to the aforementioned medium.

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