BNG national spokesperson Ana Pontón has urged this Monday to put an end to the current “normalization” of precarity, which she attributes to an “increasingly unequal” distribution of wealth. To reverse this situation, she has asked for the support of the BNG in the upcoming general elections, emphasizing that the formation defends measures so that the social majority can have “a dignified life.”
Pontón made these remarks at a media appearance after meeting with workers, young people and retirees. At this meeting, she stressed that it cannot be “normalized” that many people cannot make ends meet, that young people cannot emancipate, or that wage earners fear getting sick because of work consequences.
In her remarks, she stressed that it is key for the BNG to gain greater political weight in Madrid in order to place citizens’ needs at the forefront. In this regard, she detailed some of the proposals of the nationalists: repeal “all labor counter-reforms,” raise the SMI to 60% of the average wage, reduce the working day without pay cuts, and safeguard the right to health of the working class.
On this last point, she went after the PP for “questioning” that right, pointing to Rueda as an “advance guard” in Galicia. She accused the president of the Xunta of attacking the working class with “lies” and of treating them as “lazy people and criminals,” when Galicia is the second autonomous community with the fewest work absences due to illness. “They have to be stripped of power from the insurers (...), so that the company doesn’t decide whether an employee has to go to work—what was missing,” she emphasized.
CALL TO JOIN THE STRIKE
Pontón has reiterated that the next 29 November also has the living standards of the Galician population at stake, and she linked this Wednesday’s strike to that electoral appointment, considering it another opportunity to defend the right to a dignified life.
For this reason, she encouraged people to join the strike so that the day will be “a wake-up call” to the Xunta and also to the central government, which she described as “incapable” of responding to precarity, beyond measures that she has called “tepid.”
At the meeting this Monday, the candidates to Congress, Néstor Rego and Carme da Silva, have also taken part, who have highlighted the work of the BNG in Madrid and have insisted on the need to increase representation so that Galicia gains “political weight.” In this vein, they have called for a “major mobilization,” both on the day of the strike and in the elections, with the aim of showing that “Galician society does not give up.”