Former Alicoop Group workers have set up an association to fight the damaging legal position they are in with Eurobic taking them to court for unpaid loans.
The bank, despite an agreement to the contrary, is claiming €1.5 million from the former workers.
"We have decided to create an association so that we can defend the rights of the 245 workers to whom Eurobic claims credit for a loan that is not ours," said Paulo Martins, one of the workers' representatives.
The decision to set up the ALGA association - Association of Injured Alicoop Group - was made at a meeting that took place on Wednesday, in Silves.
According to Paulo Martins, 245 employees of the former Alicoop Group "continue to be persecuted by Eurobic, which claims an alleged non-fulfillment of a loan made in 2008 to recapitalise the company."
"The bank does not accept the judicial decision that releases workers (from the debt) and prolongs the uncertainty as to the outcome of the case," said the representative, for whom the Bank, "does not respect the insolvency plan that exempted workers from any liabilities."
This process has been going on since 2008 when 245 workers from the former Alicoop, which was part of Alisuper, Macral and Geneco supermarkets, borrowed €1.7 million from BPN with the Alicoop administration to finance the company, with the latter assuming a commitment to pay the loan installments.
The debt, which now belongs to Eurobic, after the collapse of BPN, continues to be chase the workers through the courts.
During the insolvency process, the loans, with the express agreement of BPN, were taken over by the Nogueira group, which formed N&F (Nogueira & Filhos) to buy the Alicoop Group.
In June 2013, BIC bank (now Eurobic) and the new company formed by the Nogueira Group signed an "agreement to fulfill the benefits approved in the insolvency plan, in order to comply with the judicial sentence, which will have been done until the N&F filed for insolvency." This was agreed in February 2016 by the Court of Viseu.
Bank BIC went to the N&F insolvency law suit to submit its claims and again wanted the workers to pay up.
Erurobic, in an appalling public relations move, has demanded those workers who took out the loans, should repay them and has busied itself in court by applying to nab homes, cars, salaries and furniture.
