Inform yourselves, boycott Coca-Cola

I only wish somebody from the Daily Bruin staff had attended the
forum this past November featuring William Mendoza, president of
the union SINALTRAINAL, which represents Coca-Cola bottling-plant
workers at the Barrancabermeja plant in Colombia.

Mendoza spoke of the atrocities that have been occurring in
Colombia since 1989. Nine of his coworkers have been murdered and
there have been 179 reported cases of human rights abuses. Mendoza
explains on the PBS Frontline World documentary “The
Coca-Cola Controversy” that he has seen paramilitaries enter
the office of the bottling plant on numerous occasions, and in 2003
he spotted paramilitaries taking cases of Coke to sell for
fundraising. Mendoza believes that the plant management made a deal
with the paramilitaries ““ Coca-Cola products in exchange for
union busting.

While the Coca-Cola Company has denied any benefit from the
union busting that has occurred in different forms, including
murder and torture, for 17 years in Colombia, doesn’t it make
sense that a company’s management will always benefit from
destroying the union?

Coca-Cola bottling plants will do everything they can to prevent
their workers from unionizing for basic rights, such as safety for
themselves and their families as well as decent wages. Colombia is
in a state of civil war and anti-union sentiment is extremely
prevalent; however, Coca-Cola has control over the safety of its
workers.

The Coca-Cola Company owns nearly 40 percent of stock in
Coca-Cola FEMSA, the largest bottler in Latin America. From my
research, I believe Coca-Cola is complicit with the violence
inflicted upon its employees and has remained silent for 17 years.
Instead, Coca-Cola has increased its advertising budget 30 percent
in the past two years to a staggering $2.4 billion in an attempt to
maintain a positive image .

After educating myself on Coca-Cola’s violence and abuse
all over the world through the forum with Mendoza and doing
significant research on my own, I strongly feel that we as UCLA
students have the power and responsibility to pressure the
Coca-Cola Company through a boycott of its products.

It is imperative that we stand in solidarity with the Colombian
workers, many of whose family members or friends have been deeply
affected by the atrocities committed by the Coca-Cola Company. How
can UCLA be a socially responsible institution while being a
Coke-carrying university? Whether it is an individual in a bottling
plant in Colombia or a farmer in India, Coca-Cola must be held
accountable. Until Coke takes responsibility for its brutal crimes
all over the world, it has no place at UCLA.

The Coke Free Campus coalition will keep on fighting for basic
human rights across the globe. We have considerable evidence of
Coca-Cola’s vicious crimes and we support the campus in
educating itself. Do your research. Don’t solely take my
word, Coke’s word or the Daily Bruin’s word.

I urge UCLA students to be informed and to make educated
decisions which reflect concern for a more just, fair world.
Students can feel empowered by the change that we can make here at
UCLA. Coke Free Campus will stand in solidarity with the
SINALTRAINAL bottling plant workers in Colombia and boycott
Coca-Cola until the conditions drastically change.

Markoff is a second-year political science student.