Pimec and 18 other business organizations have decided to stop being part of Conpymes due to their differences with the president of the entity, José María Torres, according to a joint statement made public this Wednesday.
The signing entities maintain that their exit responds to a "prolonged process of irregular management that the entities consider unilateral, undemocratic, and detached from the collective project that motivated their participation."
In the same text, they emphasize that "the associations denounce the instrumentalization of Conpymes and consider that the current situation is incompatible with a plural, participative business representation that serves small and medium-sized enterprises."
Conpymes was established in 2021 with the intention of becoming an alternative to the CEOE, especially in the field of SMEs. The employers' associations that have now decided to break with the confederation claim to represent 80% of the associated companies.
These organizations also do not rule out promoting a new employers' association with the aspiration of being recognized as a more representative social agent and thus having a presence at the social dialogue table alongside CEOE and the unions UGT and CCOO.
Conpymes blames the break on Pimec's demands
In statements to Europa Press, Torres has defended that "everything that has been said is false" and has placed the origin of the conflict in his refusal to sign a document that established that Pimec would occupy all the seats of Conpymes in the state social dialogue.
"We could not allow Conpymes to become a branch of Pimec," stated Torres, who also emphasized that the organizations that have left represent less than 30% of the employers' census and that the majority are linked to Pimec's board of directors.
Torres added that these entities had refused to pay the corresponding fee to the employers' association he heads, which would have meant their expulsion, and that Pimec would also have been expelled for refusing to provide information to Conpymes.