Secretary General of the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo
Head of the confederation of Spanish anarcho-syndicalist labor unions / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Secretary General of the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo is the head of the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (National Confederation of Labor; CNT), a Spanish confederation of anarcho-syndicalist labor unions. The position is elected by a congress or plenary session of the confederation. The position's powers are limited to technical and administrative affairs.
Since the confederation does not have fixed headquarters, the elected Secretary General's local federation becomes the confederation's central operations and a local plenary session of the local federation chooses the secretariats for other leadership positions. Together they are known as the Secretariado Permanente del Comité Confederal (Permanent Secretariat of the Confederal Committee, or SPCC). They, together with other regional federation's secretaries general, form the full Confederal Committee. The first general secretary of the CNT, chosen at its 1910 constitutional congress, was José Negre. He had been secretary general of Solidaridad Obrera, a Catalan union and precursor to the CNT. Thus Barcelona was the first headquarters.
The CNT operated clandestinely during years of repression and splintered. Sources support several timelines of CNT Secretaries General during this time.