Verizon Strike: Protesters Face Machine Guns In Philippines, Update and VIDEO

Editor's Note: This article is part of an ongoing series. Catch up on the latest news about the Verizon strike here.

May 13, 2016 - When a group of union strikers set out to confront company officials at Verizon’s Philippines corporate headquarters, they had no idea they’d end up being chased down the street by machine gun-wielding cops and armed security forces.

But that’s what took place during a harrowing armed confrontation on May 11 between strike sympathizers, company security and a local police SWAT unit, union representatives with the Communications Workers of America (CWA) allege.

CWA President Chris Shelton explained why union members were visiting the Philippines in a Friday news release:

“[Verizon] executives repeatedly have claimed that Verizon offshores few jobs, and none that affect our members. Recently, our union was contacted by call center workers in the Philippines who revealed that Verizon was lying to our members and the public about the extent of the off-shoring of good American jobs, so we sent four CWA members to the Philippines to learn the truth.”

According to Shelton, Verizon’s Philippines call center workers are being paid $1.78 per hour and “forced to work around the clock,” tallying between one and two hours of overtime for five days a week, plus a full, eight-hour day of overtime.

When confronted about these issues at their corporate headquarters in the Philippines on Wednesday, May 11, Verizon officials allegedly refused to speak to the union’s representatives, according to the CWA.

And that’s when things got ugly, union leaders assert.

“When [our] delegation left peacefully, Verizon had their armed private security team pull over the departing van on a public street,” the CWA alleged in its Friday news release. “The Verizon security team then called in a SWAT team, who surrounded the car, bearing automatic weapons. One police officer with his face covered in a balaclava pounded on the van window with his automatic rifle, demanding that the labor representatives leave the vehicle.”

“It was like being in a movie,” one of the union delegates told Fortune. “They were dressed all in black with masks and automatic rifles. At first they were demanding that we get out. One officer even hit the door with his gun. But we didn’t open up, we knew our rights.”

The union representatives - which included CWA staff, a representative of UNI (a global labor federation) and representatives of KMU (a Filipino union) - were eventually allowed to leave without further issue, the CWA stated.

The encounter was documented in the below videos.

When reached for comment for this article, Verizon spokesman Rich Young offered the following statement to Patch:

“Yet again, this is another page straight out of the CWA’s fictional storybook. The real question is why would CWA president Chris Shelton spend tens of thousands of dollars in union dues on a vacation to the Philippines at a time when 36,000 of our employees are lucky to get $200 a week from a union strike fund? We look forward to having our employees back at work at a company that provides excellent wages, healthcare and retirement benefits.”

Young declined to comment when asked about how many employees and contractors Verizon uses in the Philippines, and at what salaries/hours they work.

WHY ARE PHILIPPINES WORKERS SUPPORTING VERIZON STRIKERS?

Members of the BIEN Philippines labor organization issued the following statement in solidarity with striking Verizon workers in the United States:

“We are one with the 39,000 strong striking workers who walked off their jobs to fight their rights for decent jobs and benefits. We criticize Verizon’s unwillingness to negotiate with people who work in their stores and condemn the attack to job security by closing their call centers. Their stories and actions inspired us to do the same in painstakingly organizing and unionizing the Philippine BPO industry.”

The BIEN members continued:

“In the Philippines, employees working under Verizon accounts housed by a few BPO companies are now faced with issues such as forced overtime and under staffing. Hence, we urge the Verizon management to go back to the negotiating table to get a better agreement in favor of the workers.”

OUTSOURCING CALL CENTER JOBS

Verizon has confirmed that it utilizes call-center operations in Mexico, India and the Philippines, and that it wants to consolidate several of its call centers to increase “operating efficiency.”

“They are sending 5,000 jobs to [these countries]” said Edward Mooney, district vice president of the Communications Workers of America.

Verizon declined to comment on Patch’s inquiry about its outsourcing totals.

“One of Verizon’s key demands in the strike is the ability to close several call centers based on the East Coast, which are staffed by union members who earn a living wage with decent benefits,” CWA representatives stated on Friday. “The company also wants to reduce the percentage of call center work that must be handled within the state that it originates from, another ploy that enables it to shift work to low-wage, non-union domestic contractors, or to Filipino or Mexican call centers.”

“Verizon is terrified that the public might find out about what has happened to the good middle-class jobs the company has shipped to the Philippines,” said Dennis Trainor, President of CWA District One.

“The truth is that Verizon is destroying middle-class American jobs so that it can pay workers $1.78 per hour and force them to work around the clock, rather than preserve good jobs in our communities. That’s what our strike is about. Instead of profiting off of poverty abroad, Verizon should come back to the table and negotiate a fair contract that protects middle-class jobs.”

A strike supporter wrote the following message on the Stand Up To Verizon Facebook page:

“I kinda get it. Everything is cyclical. So while we are standing as one to stop even one more call from being routed outside this country, we may never get back a lot of those that already are. If we get those workers to stand with us and start to demand the wages and benefits they deserve, it will become less and less profitable to continue outsourcing that work.”

Members of the CWA, along with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), launched a national strike against Verizon on April 13.

The nearly 40,000 striking workers include about 13,000 U.S. call center workers, CWA representatives stated.

• Catch up on the latest news and history of the Verizon worker strike of 2016 here

Send news tips, photos and press releases to eric.kiefer@patch.com

Photos/videos courtesy of the CWA