Uruguayan referendum result could see strikes banned and picketing criminalised

URUGUAYANS opted not to overturn 137 contentious articles of President Luis Lacalle Pou’s law of urgent consideration (LUC) by the narrowest of margins in a referendum on Sunday.
With 99 per cent of the ballots counted, 48.82 per cent of the votes were in favour of overturning the measures and 49.9 per cent were against.
In a country where voting is compulsory, the 1.32 per cent of ballots papers left blank were added to the latter, thus giving them an unassailable 51.22 per cent margin of victory.
More from this author

After brutal police crackdowns on pensioners and the forced approval of secret IMF deals, trade unions are finally responding to grassroots pressure and fighting back against savage neoliberal reforms, reports BERT SCHOUWENBURG

Global South governments’ sovereignty and ability to decide future economic policy are severely compromised by signing free trade agreements, whose terms are heavily weighted in favour of the already wealthy countries of the global North, writes BERT SCHOUWENBURG

BERT SCHOUWENBURG details how the libertarian, radical-right president’s shock doctrine has pushed millions into poverty while dismantling the state and aligning with US imperialism and Israeli slaughter

The last six months have seen the self-styled ‘libertarian capitalist’ bulldoze workers’ rights and national sovereignty, as his crazed shock-doctrine economic reforms face growing resistance on the streets, writes BERT SCHOUWENBURG