Workers protest as GE and Siemens fight over Alstom

As company giants GE and Siemens both fight over who gets France’s Alstom, the workers, who found themselves in the middle of this battlefield, are worried about their jobs.

On Tuesday, workers went to the streets and protested in front of the Alstom headquarters in Paris and other plants in France.

As it seems that it will be several weeks before Alstom’s fate is decided, union representatives among the protesters said they want a guarantee that no layoffs will be made after the takeover is finalized.

Opinions differ when it comes to who workers prefer to take over Alstom.

‘Whether its the American predator or the German predator, either means the disappearance of the group, it would just disintegrate and the future would be very uncertain for the employees and for the group’s activities,’ said Christian Garnier, with the CGT trade union.

But another worker, another opinion, as Jean-Loup Olivier with the CFE-CGC union, stated otherwise: ‘We would rather have GE which would be better for us because the activities of both companies complement each other. Whereas with the other solution of a European company [Siemens] – which we know well – there is total competition over all of our sectors and so that would be fatal to Alstom’s activities in the short and medium term.’

Meanwhile, The French Economy Minister Arnaud Montebourg, who has kept a close eye on the development of the Alstom situation and is trying to defend the workers rights, accused Patrick Kron, head of Alstom, of keeping the ongoing negotiations secret.

‘Should I have installed a lie detector in my office?’ said an angry Montebourg.

Alstom accepted the US conglomerate General Electric’s offer of $12 billion and is now waiting for the German engineering firm Siemens to come with a counter-offer.