44 Delhaize stores are still closed on Wednesday. This represents a quarter of integrated stores. The movement began almost a month ago and the management is concerned to see supermarkets closed before the Easter weekend. So she’s trying to get the employees back to work. For example, the strikers no longer have access to the toilets or to the airlock at the entrance to the stores.
A video taken by the Delhaize d’Enghien strikers circulates among the workers of the lion sign. We see an employee transporting a WC cabin on a pallet truck. This is the solution they found following the management’s decision to no longer give them access to the toilets. “We took a construction toilet that was lying around a little further from the store”explains David Ducarmois, CGSLB union representative. “It’s very hard because we don’t know how long it will last, nor what they will still find following to harden the movement. It’s provocation on the part of the management”he continues.
The same goes for the airlock, the strikers can no longer shelter there. In general, workers tell us that management has hardened its tone. “We really feel that Delhaize wants to reopen for Easter and will do everything possible to reopen for Easter. We are also threatening to close certain stores if the staff does not want to work once more. We are really going there more and more crescendo”laments Charlotte Lorent, CNE union representative.
The Delhaize spokesperson also tells us that the bailiffs have been sent to around ten stores so far. To convince and reassure workers, human resources managers also meet staff. “They come to explain that we are not risking anything, that the franchise is not serious. At the limit, almost as if we will have more acquired, but it is totally false. They were even booed in Enghien by the staff”says Fabian Chiarello, SETCA trade union delegate.
44 stores are still closed. All of them tell us they are waiting for the conciliation meeting on April 18. Until then, they are determined to continue the blockade.
