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FLINS, France – The arrest of Carlos Ghosn, former president of Nissan Motor Co. and until recently president and CEO of the big French car manufacturer Renault SA, caused a shock wave in this city located about 20 km north-west of Paris on the banks of the Seine.
Arrested in Japan for several counts, including suspicions of misuse of Nissan's funds for personal purposes, Carlos Ghosn was infamous at the Renault Flins factory as a "cost cutter" ". Workers have strong feelings about him for forcing the plant down.
The Flins factory manufactures the Nissan Micra – a model marketed under the name "March" in Japan – since 2017. It is known to be an outpost symbolizing the desire of French President Emmanuel Macron to make a name for himself. use Renault's alliance with Nissan to increase employment in France.
According to senior factory officials, however, since Ghosn took over Renault in 2005, job cuts have been recorded. A factory employee, about 50 years old, said about Ghosn that he was waiting for the former leader to go to jail and that it was natural that he be stopped. He called Ghosn, who allegedly used corporate funds for his personal use, a "thief," and added, "We do not support thieves."
Much of the French media reports are favorable to Ghosn, including his long-term detention by the Japanese authorities. However, a 46-year-old employee of the Flins plant said Ghosn had "disgusted" the workers and wondered why he had not been arrested earlier.
On the employee parking lot, there are few Renault cars. Many vehicles parked on-site come from competing automakers, such as Toyota and Volkswagen. There is even a worker inside the factory wearing a shirt from another major French car manufacturer, Peugeot.
Ali Kaya, a central CGT union delegate in the 48-year-old Flins factory, said that along with staff cuts, nearly half of the factory's employees had been hired for contracts short term of a minimum duration of one month but less than three months. Kaya, who has been working continuously at the factory since 1997, says that many workers are not proud to work for Renault because they now manufacture Nissan cars. In addition, some could end their contract at Peugeot then come to work at Renault next week for a short stay [see reference].
In addition to Nissan and Renault, Ghosn has made numerous layoffs at Russian carmakers AvtoVAZ and Romania's Dacia SA. Kaya raised his voice when he said that Ghosn was the enemy of workers around the world.
A 23-year-old new employee at the newly hired Flins plant said that when Mr. Ghosn met new recruits last October, he told employees that the job itself was not not very important, but the improvement in productivity was. Aged 23, he said that he represented the philosophy of the company and felt like "a religion".
Working conditions are deteriorating more and more, but many employees are immigrants and workplace culture is not the one in which they feel comfortable asking for improvements, lest their job status resident is revoked. According to several employees, the early morning shift starts at 5am. With the exception of two breaks to go to the washroom (approximately 10 minutes each), employees are forbidden to leave their positions until the end of their shift at 1 pm It is said that some workers start crying because they can not help getting wet or dirtying their clothes.
An badembly line worker stated that workers are forced to compete to improve their "productivity" and meet their quotas. And some workers have developed emotional or physical problems due to the monotony of repetitive housework.
The workers are also angry with the French government, Renault's largest shareholder. On the walls of employee offices, there were a large number of posters criticizing the government. The yellow vests – the same ones worn by people participating in anti-government protests across the country at the end of last year – were scattered. A 46-year-old factory worker who participated in the protests said, "We have little respect for both (Ghosn) or Macron, I just feel anger at them."
Renault was founded in 1898 under the name Société Renault Frères by the industrialist Louis Renault and his two brothers. In 1945, shortly after the end of the Second World War, the President of the Provisional Government of the French Republic, Charles de Gaulle, promulgated a decree that nationalized the manufacturer. With its innovative designs as a major badet, Renault cars are spreading among the French public. The company was privatized in 1996, but even today, the French government holds a 15% stake and participates in the company's activities.
"The French state is only interested in dividends," said Fabien Gache, central delegate of the 55-year-old CGT syndicate at Renault in Mainichi Shimbun. He went on to say that the government did not have in mind the interests of the employees of the company. As for Ghosn, Gache added angrily, he reduced the number of workers, reduced wages, and wreaked havoc on the health of the workers.
Near the Flins factory is even a street named after Louis Renault, founder of the car manufacturer. It takes 20 minutes walk from the factory to get to the nearest station in this street, but there is absolutely no other pedestrian. It's a ghost town now, but the neighborhood was seemingly bustling in recent years, until the factory lost a lot of its jobs and as the city lost the essentials of its dynamism. On the one hand, the cost reduction measures implemented by Ghosn have been very beneficial for shareholders. However, the anger of the workers sacrificed for the benefit of these shareholders has been greater than expected. Who do societies exist for? Renault faces this old and new question.
(Original Japanese Kohei Misawa, General Office for Europe)
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