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SANTIAGO DE CUBA, April 3 (Carlos Pascual Borrel, APLO / www.cubanet.org) -
Street sweepers wait for the government to remember the demands they have made
for improvements in working conditions.
"We have asked for improvements in working conditions, and in salary,
but in vain up to now," said one employee of the Community Services
Company, who didn't want to be identified for fear of losing his job.
Street sweepers say they have to cover about two kilometers (about a mile
and a quarter), lugging the cans in which they pick up garbage, weighing about
160 pounds in ten-hour days.
Monthly pay is 178 pesos, or 6.85 dollars at the official exchange rate.
The workers are provided by their employer with two bars of soap and one
package of detergent a year.
Many of the street sweepers in Santiago, Cuba's second largest city, work
without shoes or gloves. Sometimes they have to pick up dead animals or
excrement from the street.
Versión
original en español
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