Puerto Rico Comes to Halt as Unions Launch Strike

A coalition of Puerto Rican labor unions lived up to their acronym--CAOS, which means chaos in Spanish--by launching a general strike on the island Tuesday that disrupted normal business and tourism and shut down the main road to San Juan’s international airport.

Protected by police escorts, travelers trying to make early morning flights from Luis Munoz Marin International Airport were forced to walk miles to the terminals after strikers blocked the roadway with cars and trucks.

“We drove backward, parked beside a road and walked 2 1/2 hours to get here,” U.S. Navy Cmdr. John Winkler, 43, told a reporter at the airport.

Traffic was cleared by 10 a.m. after Police Chief Pedro Toledo showed up to negotiate with union leaders. A spokeswoman for American Airlines, which has its Caribbean hub in San Juan, said a 7:30 a.m. flight to Miami was canceled when only 59 of its 139 passengers were able to get to the airport.

By midmorning, however, all American and American Eagle flights in and out of San Juan were on schedule, said spokeswoman Martha Pantin in Miami.

“The unions have been successful in bringing the island to a standstill,” said Sergio Fernandez, general manager of a San Juan radio station. “They showed what they can do when they want to do it.”

In anticipation of the strike, major stores and shopping malls throughout the island had announced earlier that they would be closed. Many tourists went home or canceled vacations altogether.

“It reminded me of Christmas day,” said Katherine Calzada, 34, taking a day off from her job as spa director at the Ritz Carlton San Juan Hotel and Casino. “Very few cars, and the few people about are looking for that one open shop.”

The general strike, planned to run two days, was called by a coalition of 53 island unions in support of about 6,400 telephone company workers who walked off their jobs June 18 to protest the proposed sale of the government-owned company to a consortium of private firms headed by GTE Corp. of Stamford, Conn.

Labor leaders estimated that 500,000 Puerto Ricans participated in the strike, but government officials would not confirm the figure.

Annie Cruz, president of both the coalition and the telephone workers’ union, said the general strike was called to force Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Rossello either to call off the $1.8-billion sale, or to call for a referendum on the proposal. Union leaders accuse Rossello, who favors statehood for this U.S. commonwealth of 3.8 million residents, of “selling the patrimony of the people.”

“We more than anyone love social peace and tranquillity,” said Cruz in a radio message aired Tuesday. “But never at the cost of our dignity.”

In an effort to privatize government-run industries considered inefficient, Rossello already has sold off state hospitals, prisons, ports and hotels. Since losing its monopoly on local telephone service with the 1996 Telecommunications Act, the Puerto Rican Telephone Co.’s market share has dropped to 35%.

But the proposed sale of the telephone company has been met with fierce opposition from union members and supporters, who have been staging a series of flag-waving protests at company offices throughout the Caribbean island, located 1,000 miles southeast of Miami.

Union members also have been blamed for about 250 bomb threats and 30 acts of sabotage, many directed at Banco Popular, the largest local firm involved in the phone company purchase. All 198 Banco Popular branches were closed Tuesday.

In a brief statement Tuesday, Rossello reiterated his pledge to see that the sale--already approved by the Puerto Rican Congress--is approved by the federal government.

Times researcher Anna M. Virtue contributed to this story.