Colombia Solidarity Campaign website: www.colombiasolidarity.org.uk

Coca-Cola is one of the world's most powerful and profitable corporations. Yet, despite repeated pleas for help, the corporation has not found the time or resources to insure the most basic safety of its workers or prevent massive environmental devastation in the communities where it does business.


Coca Cola in Colombia. SINALTRAINAL, the trade union that represents Coke workers in Colombia, have suffered the assassination of 8 of their leaders, killed by paramilitaries allegedly hired by Coca Cola management. The union has also witnessed the imprisonment, forced displacement, torture and death threats against hundreds of workers at Coca Cola bottling plants throughout the country.

Coca-Cola in India stands accused of draining and poisoning the water people need
to survive. In Plachimada in Kerala, local people have held a 24 hour vigil since April 2001 outside a bottling factory which siphons off 1.5 million litres every day. Without water for their crops, thousands of poor farmers have lost their livelihood.


Coca-Cola in Turkey fired 105 workers in May 2005. The day before Coca-Cola officials told workers that "if you don't quit the union, I will end your contract." On July 20th, while a sacked worker representative attempted to reach a temporary resolution, Turkish riot police brutally beat up roughly 150 workers and their families with clubs. This occured inside the Coca-Cola compound and with the approval of Coke officials.

In the US: 20 universities and colleges have already boycotted Coke products including New York, Michigan and Rutgers. A massive campaign is building up. The Teamsters, the largest Coke union in the world, supports the campaign. This support was reaffirmed in January 2006.

The Campaign in the UK: This year the contracts that UK students have collectively with Coca Cola are up for renewal. Its failure to address human rights and environmental concerns leads us to believe that the only incentive for Coca-Cola to change its behavior and act in good faith towards those affected is through us ending our student union contracts with them.

Ray has been described in the American press as "labor's most innovative strategist" and "a labor legend." Time magazine commented that "Rogers has brought some of the most powerful corporations to their knees, and his ideas are spreading."

In the mid-90s, big business interests launched an unsuccessful effort in the United States Congress to outlaw "corporate campaigns," the term Ray coined in 1976 to describe strategies and tactics he employs to help achieve victories for labour and other victims of corporate abuse.

Ray believes that the only way to challenge abusive corporations like Coca-Cola is to "confront power with power."