Mexican Labor News & Analysis: March , 2007

On March 14th ORLANDO PESCINA CAMPOS, MARCO ANTONIO LUCIO SALAS, SANTIAGO GRIMALDO ZAVALA, and RAMON MALDONADO NUÑEZ, members of the union’s strike committee, were fired from their jobs at the Continental Tire plant in San Luis Potosí, Mexico.

Under the Federal Labor Law of Mexico the failure to begin a strike at the appointed date and hour contained in the union’s notice provides the employer with a strong legal basis for challenging the validity of the strike. In this case, at the time that the union began its strike for failure to sign a contract no agreement had yet been reached. The negotiating committee was to inform the strike committee of any agreement, and 15 minutes later they terminated the strike, after learning that the contract had been finalized.

Nevertheless, the company fired the four workers for having implemented the strike notice, despite the lack of a settlement at the time the strike was initiated.

Protest letters requested

The union has requested that letters of protest be sent to PHILLIP VANHOUTAN , with copies to SERGIO CORONADO LOPEZ , ERASMO GARDUÑO MIRANDA and SERGIO NAVARRETE MENDOZA .

Please also send a copy of your letter to: EFREN ESCORZA, General Secretary of the union at: .

A copy of the letter sent by president of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) appears below. Please feel free to use it as a model or draft your own.

Protest Letter Sent by UE

PHILLIP VANHOUTAN
Director de Planta March 30, 2007
Continental Llantera Potosina

Dear Mr. Van Houtan,

I am writing to you on behalf of the officers and 30,000 members of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America to express our grave concern about the discharge, on March 14, of ORLANDO PESCINA CAMPOS, MARCO ANTONIO LUCIO SALAS, SANTIAGO GRIMALDO ZAVALA, and RAMON MALDONADO NUÑEZ, workers at the Continental Tire plant in San Luis Potosí Mexico.

We have been advised that on the 14th of March, at the time that the union had notified your company that a strike would begin for failure to sign a contract, no agreement had yet been reached. The negotiating committee was to inform the strike committee of any agreement, and, as I am certain you are aware, under the Federal Labor Law of Mexico the failure to begin a strike at the appointed date and hour provides the legal basis for challenging the validity of a strike. The strike committee fulfilled its responsibilities in initiating the strike, and terminated it 15 minutes later, after learning that the contract had been finalized.

To fire workers under these circumstances is unjust, and violates both Mexican and international law.

We urge you to take immediate steps to rectify this situation, reinstating the fired workers with full back pay.

Sincerely,

John H. Hovis, Jr.
General President

cc: SERGIO CORONADO LOPEZ, Gerente de Recursos Humanos
ERASMO GARDUÑO MIRANDA, Gerente de Manufactura
SERGIO NAVARRETE MENDOZA, Jefe Laboral
EFREN ESCORZA, Secretario General

Andrés Manuel López Obrador who calls himself the “legitimate president of Mexico” convened the Second National Democratic Convention in the Zócalo on March 25, pledging to his supporters “to take the measures necessary to defend” the Mexican Petroleum Company (PEMEX). The tens of thousands in the crowd—smaller than the gathering of last year that reached more than two million on one occasion—also pledged to do so.“We will not permit the Mexican oil industry to be given over to private parties be they national or foreign,” said López Obrador.

PEMEX is a state-owned company but some capitalists in both Mexico and the United States would like to see it privatized. Recent news reports have suggested that PEMEX is in a deep crisis and pundits recommend that it needs an infusion of foreign capital. Felipe Calderón has not called for the privatization of PEMEX, but has suggested that the company and the union conduct an investigation and recommend a policy. Many fear Calderón’s call for a study is a strategy to build support for privatization. López Obrador and his supporters strongly oppose any attempt at privatization. Earlier in March, López Obador warned President George W. Bush that he should not attempt to take Mexico’s oil, which under the Mexican Constitution belongs to all of the people.

The Opposition Movement Alive and Well, if Weaker

López Obrador’s appearance at the second CND was an affirmation that he and his movement continue to be in the struggle to oust Felipe Calderón, who he calls the “usurper,” and to bring about the downfall of his government. López Obrador has called for a Constituent Assembly to write a new Constitution and to re-found the Mexican government. In effect, it is a call for another Mexican Revolution, but a non-violent one.

López Obrador spent much of his time attacking the Mexican tax structure, particularly the tax on earnings or ISR. He argued that working people pay most of the taxes, while the rich and the corporations pay far less. In what became a lecture on fiscal policy, he pointed out that Mexican corporations paid 118 million pesos in ISR while workers paid 182 millions. However, corporations receive 60 percent of all income while working people receive only 30 percent. Some of the biggest tax evaders, he said, were the Mexican Cement company (CEMEX), Grupo Maseca, Coca Cola and Wal-Mart.

While not as large as early rallies called during the election period, López Obrador’s “legitimate government” and his movement of national resistance seem to be alive and well.

Zapatistas’ Other Campaign

At the same time that López Obrador was urging Mexicans to stand behind his movement for peaceful revolution, Subcomandante Marcos of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) was launching the second installment of the Other Campaign. Like López Obrador, Marcos also calls for a peaceful revolution, though in his case as he recently said, a revolution “to overthrow capitalism.” While López Obrador insists that he won the election and should be installed as president, Marcos says that he and the Zapatistas now do want to take power. During the recent election campaign López Obrador’s political movement attracted millions of followers and organized demonstrations as large as 2.5 million people and the occupation of the heart of Mexico City for several days. Marcos and the EZLN, on the other hand were overshadowed by that movement, and seldom attracted more than a few thousand supporters.

In any case, both groups continue to agitate, calling upon the Mexican people to end this government and create a new one.

President George W. Bush of the United States visited Mexico in mid-March as part of a Latin American tour intended to shore up his country’s influence in the region. Mexican president Felipe Calderón used the visit as an opportunity to redefine Mexico’s foreign policy and to express his opposition to the U.S. border wall while calling for better treatment for Mexican immigrants. At the same time, the two presidents concurred in their commitment to conservative free trade economic policies.

Faced with challenges from Latin American governments moving leftward, from the moderate Brazil and Argentina to the more radical Bolivia and Venezuela, Bush worked to strengthen the positions of more conservative governments such as those of Colombia, Guatemala and Mexico. With Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez calling for the creation of twenty-first century socialism in the region, president Bush modified his usual call for something more like nineteenth century laissez-faire with references to the importance of social programs for the poor. This was Bush’s first visit to Mexico since the election of Mexican president Felipe Calderón.

In Mexico, as elsewhere throughout Latin America, Bush was met with protest demonstrations. In Latin American countries such as Uruguay, huge demonstrations of labor unions, poor peoples movements and women’s organizations challenged the American president who many called a “fascist” and an “imperialist.” In Mexico City, hundreds of radical demonstrators attacked the U.S. embassy where they threw stones, burned flags and were eventually dispersed by riot police using tear gas. In Mérida where presidents Bush and Felipe Calderón actually met, riot police attacked demonstrators camped out in the city’s plaza the night before the presidents’ meeting, injuring many and jailing numbers of them.

President Calderón took advantage of the meeting to redefine Mexico’s relationship to the United States. Calderón, who had been expected to serve as Bush’s man in Latin America, indicated that Mexico would preserve its traditionally independent foreign policy and attempt to reestablish relations with Venezuela. The Mexican president put the onus for drugs and border issues on the United States, telling Bush that the United States had to do more to deal with the drug issues. The Mexican president also indicated his opposition to the U.S. border wall. He told Bush as he welcomed him:

“We fully respect the right that the government and the people of the United States has to decide within its territory what will be best for their concerns and security. But at the same time we do consider in a respectful way that "migration can't be stopped with a fence.” President promised Calderón he would push the U.S. Congress to pass a reform of the U.S. immigration laws that would benefit Mexican workers.

Calderón also injected a personal note into the issue of Mexican immigration to the United States. Asked by a reporter if he had Mexican relatives in the United States, Calderón said that he did. “What I can tell you is that they are people who work and respect that country, people who pay taxes to your government, people who harvest the vegetables that you probably eat, who serve the plates in restaurants, who contribute to the prosperity of the United States,” Calderon said.

“They are the best of our people,” Calderon said,“because they are the boldest, the youngest, the strongest, the most talented, who have overcome enormous adversity to arrive there.”

Led by the Mexican Electrical Workers Union (SME), tens of thousands of workers and other citizens filled Mexico City’s zócalo, the national Plaza of the Constitution on March 8 to protest the economic policy of Felipe Calderón. SME and its allies oppose, in particular, Calderón’s call for privatizing electric power generation and worry about the privatization of petroleum.

Joining SME were the Mexican Miners Union (SNTMMRM), a miners’ widows’ organization, the Streetcar Workers Alliance, the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO) and the urban poor people’s organization, the Francisco Villa Popular Front. Also participating was the National Organization of Popular Power affiliated with the “legitimate government” of Andés Manuel López Obrador.

Martín Esparza, leader of the Electrical Workers Union which was about to enter into negotiations with the government, asked the managers of the state owned company, “How would you like to conduct the negotiations: With light? Or without light?” he said. “If you are trying to provoke a strike, understand that we are prepared.”

Women have not only acted as participants in the ongoing popular movement in Oaxaca, but have also profoundly shaped the course of its history. They have created some of the most powerful stories and moments in the past nine months, and have helped tell them. Stories of women who have built the movement are everywhere in Oaxaca.

There are the stories of housewives arrested and beaten by police, who in response have begun to organize for the first time in their lives. There are the stories of elderly women from local communities who have cooked huge pots of food for people guarding barricades and soothed tear-gassed eyes with vinegar and Coke. Then there are the stories of women who have been involved since the beginning, participating in the teachers’ strike or organizing the movement to support it. Their stories, of personal histories aligned with the movement since its very inception, are the ones that may best shed light on how women have helped create a widespread and lasting popular resistance in Oaxaca.

Florina Jiménez Lucas is one of those women. As a teacher, she actively participated in the camp that the teachers’ union set up in the central square of the state’s capital city on May 22, 2006. When the movement grew following a police attack to dislodge the camp, Florina’s participation grew alongside it. She introduced her car mechanic husband to the popular movement; he and their three children became her frequent companions at meetings and marches. As a family, they participated in guard duty at barricades placed throughout the city to keep police from attacking neighborhoods. She or her husband often spent entire nights on watch.

Florina’s reflections on the movement continued to deepen, leading her to wonder about her own community. She refers to San Felipe, the area where she lives, as “a forgotten town where powerful men have bought up large plots of land.” She says that “extreme poverty and extreme wealth live side by side” in San Felipe, and that the state’s powerful figures often hold meetings in the “castles they have built” there. On July 1, she organized the first group of neighbors to take action in San Felipe. They covered the community with posters in support of the popular movement. On that same day, governor Ulises Ruiz arrived in San Felipe to attend a meeting. The words and images of his opposition were there to greet him.

One month later, Florina participated with 20,000 others in a women’s march that was to become historic. Since the inception of APPO, one of its principal demands had been for adequate coverage of the popular movement on radio stations and public television. As the media continued to favor the government version of events, women decided it was time to take action. Drawing inspiration from women in Chile in the 1970s – who took to the streets with pots and pans in hand to demand the return of the disappeared – the women organized a march for August 1, 2006.

The Pots & Pans March

The March of Pots & Pans, as it became known, turned into a notorious chapter in the history of the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO). Leyla Centeno, who helped organize the march, tells the story of that day in vivid detail. She is one of the young activists whose tireless organizing has helped to build APPO and the popular resistance in Oaxaca. She tells how the women arrived at the building of Channel 9, the state-run television station, and requested just fifteen minutes of live airtime to voice their demands. When the management refused to grant them any broadcast time, the women peacefully took over the building and occupied its studios.

Their first broadcast aired that same night, and began, “Today, we family women, armed only with bravery, decided to take over this corrupt station once and for all.” Speaking of the management at Channel 9, the women continued, “they have not wanted to broadcast the popular unity that we are living as part of this movement; so now it is time, we have had enough, and we are asking you, our good neighbors of Oaxaca, to join in the struggle of these brave women.” The women broadcast stories and films from the movement, as well as cultural programs including pieces on indigenous music, art and dance, for three consecutive weeks. The ratings for Channel 9 had never been higher.

At 4:00am on August 21, unidentified assailants opened fire on the women occupying the building and destroyed the station’s satellite, cutting off its signal. This violence was part of a growing, brutal repression against the popular movement and the people of Oaxaca. On August 10, Florina Jiménez Lucas experienced that violence firsthand. While participating in another march alongside her husband, she heard shots ring out nearby. Her husband was shot nine times and killed. The autopsy report confirmed that he was shot from above, with bullets from .22 and .38 caliber weapons, which are standard police-issue.

Since his death, Florina continues to participate in organizing and protesting, and has been speaking publicly about her husband’s murder since August. The government has challenged the findings of the autopsy report and has not proceeded with a criminal investigation. She has been threatened and followed since his death, and has had to leave her house; she says it is the support of other women and families in APPO that has helped her survive.

The Founding of COMO

Partly as a way to organize concrete means of support for women who have suffered the effects of violence, arrests, death and disappearances, and partly as a way to consolidate the power that women accumulated during months of organizing, the women of APPO organized to create a women’s arm of the movement. The new organization was officially established at an assembly held on August 31, 2006; it was named the August 1st Coordinating Body of Oaxacan Women (COMO).

Leyla Centeno, one of the founders of COMO, says “there was already a women’s movement, but we needed to give it organization and structure; it was time to truly include ourselves in the struggle.” She says that women from many different sectors and regions of Oaxaca took part in that first meeting, and have since begun to say not only, “I am APPO,” but also, “I am COMO.” While the COMO manifesto created on that day echoes APPO in demanding justice, dignity and autonomy and proposing concrete means of achieving such demands, it also includes a critical demand for gender equity and specific proposals to change social and educational conditions to improve the lives of women.

COMO continued to organize through the months of September, October and November, despite increasing levels of repression and state-sponsored violence. Its effect was clearly seen during the Constitutional Congress held by APPO on November 10-12, when members voted to establish gender equity requirements in representation. Although a proposal to establish a 50-50% gender split for representatives was not approved, the assembly passed a resolution to ensure that women comprise at least 30% of all representatives. While this requirement does not adequately reflect women’s participation in the movement, it is highly significant in Mexican politics that a large and powerful popular movement adopted such a binding, explicit gender equity clause.

On December 17, 2006, the women took to the streets of Oaxaca once again. After twenty-one days held incommunicado in prison, 43 of the 141 people who had been arrested during the Seventh Mega March were to be released. The atmosphere at that moment in Oaxaca was one of suppressed fear and stealthy repression. The government was preparing for Christmas and New Year’s celebrations by erasing the marks of APPO on the city; the governor was claiming that everything had “returned to normal.” As the prisoners were brought to a small plaza outside the city center, women organized a reception line to greet family members and compañeros with flowers, hugs, shouts and banners. A few released prisoners spoke to local and international independent press gathered in the square. Others spoke with international journalists and activists in private the next day, accompanied by Leyla Centeno and other women from COMO as they gave their difficult testimonies.

True Compañeras

As 2007 arrived and brought with it Three Kings Day, the traditional Mexican day for exchanging Christmas gifts, the women continued their support of prisoners – those still in prison as well as those released – and their families. COMO organized a public collection site in the center of the city where they gathered gifts for children from affected families. Piles of colorful toys, traditional cakes, and school and art supplies rose in front of the Santo Domingo Cathedral. A children’s march was organized to arrive at the city center and culminate in a family festival. The government placed large buses across the children’s path, and surrounded the women with metal barricades guarded by riot police. The children changed their route; the women waited out the police, who had broken a judicial injunction ordering them to permit free access to the area. The day was marred by illegal repression and intimidation, but ended in celebration.

Despite such acts of repression, as well as the widespread use of violence and torture, the movement in Oaxaca has endured. Women such as Florina Jiménez Lucas and Leyla Centeno have played a crucial role in ensuring that it does. Whether they are marching with pots and pans in hand, speaking publicly in newspapers or on the air, organizing behind bars in high-security prisons, or greeting loved ones returning from painful detentions, women are constantly working to hold the movement together. Women have participated in the movement at every stage of its development, and organized to create their own space within it. Their actions have shaped the popular resistance and sustained it; they have given voice to its dignity and to its rage.

As Leyla Centeno recalls male teachers shouting in support of the women who took over Channel 9, “Now that’s what I call true compañeras!”

* Ms. Teitel participated in a human rights delegation to oaxaca in December, 2006. This article originally appeared in the March/April issue of Against the Current.

After a year of being raped by her father on a weekly basis in hotel rooms, 16-year-old Graciela Hernández (not her real name) became pregnant. When she and her mother reported the rapes and resulting pregnancy to authorities in their home state of Guanajuato, Mexico in 2002, investigators were abusive and skeptical and suggested that the sex was consensual. Hernáandez told them repeatedly that she did not want to have the baby, that she could not love it since it was her father's and the result of rape. She wanted an abortion, which is a legal right for women who have been raped in Mexico. Aside from a nationwide exemption for rape and several other exemptions on a state-by-state basis, abortion is illegal throughout Mexico and women can be jailed for having an abortion.

State officials convinced Hernández to change her story to say that she and her father had consensual sex, so he would not go to jail. However incest is not considered rape in Mexico, but rather a two-party “crime against the family,” and under-age victims face the same criminal penalties including possible jail time as their adult attackers. Since incest is not considered rape, Hernández was not allowed to have an abortion. She delivered the baby, and still lives with her parents and child, according to researchers with Human Rights Watch who documented her case and those of other rape victims in Mexico for a 2006 report.

Las Libres Defends Women’s Abortion Rights

Hernández got support from Las Libres, a Guanajuato women's rights group founded by Verónica Cruz, who recently received Human Rights Watch's annual award for “International Defenders of Social Justice.” Cruz founded Las Libres five years ago to help women access their legal right to abortion after rape in Guanajuato, which is the state considered to have the country's most restrictive anti-abortion laws. In the time the organization has existed, Cruz said, the government has failed to provide even one abortion to a rape victim. Women with enough resources can legally pay for an abortion from a private clinic if they are raped, but low-income women have nowhere to turn. Las Libres provides legal aid and funding for abortions along with peer counseling and other services; so far this year they have helped 10 rape victims get abortions. The group also works to combat the overall sexism and impunity that usually allows rapists to escape unpunished and puts women through a “second rape” if they try to report the crime and receive medical treatment or an abortion. “They say women are liars and are inventing the rape to get an abortion,” said Cruz. “Or they say the women invited the rape, that they're easy. They say, it’s how were you dressed. They ask, did you like him or not? In Mexico women are treated as sexual objects, not people. If a woman is walking alone in the street, anyone can insult her or touch her body. Even in her own house, she can be raped and abused.” Cruz said that rape victims who become pregnant are legally supposed to have three options “to keep the baby, put it up for adoption or terminate the pregnancy. But in reality there are only two options,” Cruz said. “The third one doesn't really exist.” In fact, a 2003 study found 74 percent of low-income women weren't aware rape victims are legally entitled to abortion. Human Rights Watch found that many doctors are also not aware of this right; and doctors regularly try to dissuade women from having abortions—one doctor told a patient to bring a hearse and coffin for the fetus. Hence many women “rape victims and otherwise” turn to illegal abortions and suffer serious health consequences such infection, hemorrhaging or may even die as a result.

Even if a rape victim does decide to bear the child and put it up for adoption, Cruz said hospital staff and patients will pressure her to keep the baby. “They say she's not a good mother, she's not a real woman,” said Cruz. And in some states, a woman is required to keep a baby for six months before putting it up for adoption. If she doesn't, she can be charged with the crime of child abandonment. “Women are always supposed to be mothers, it is supposed to be the highest priority in our lives according to society, especially to the men in power,” said Cruz.

Women who try to seek abortions have not only been harassed and intimidated, but bounced from one agency to another in a bureaucratic maze that is expensive and lengthy to navigate. Abortions are not allowed after three months in Guanajuato, so in many cases the delay alone prevents women from getting one. This was the case for a young mentally disabled woman who was raped and impregnated by a neighbor in Guanajuato. Her mother helped her seek an abortion, pleading that she couldn't afford to feed another mouth and that “this child will keep reminding (her daughter) of what happened,” according to the Human Rights Watch report. But the public prosecutor told the mother “abortion is a crime,” and the pregnancy was beyond three months before she could not obtain an abortion. The Guanajuato attorney general told Human Rights Watch researchers that in five years no rape victim had requested an abortion, even though Las Libres had worked with numerous women who had indeed reported a rape and sought an abortion.

Rape in Mexico: Crime Denied and Women Blamed

Though there are no reliable statistics, rape is thought to be exceedingly common in Mexico. It is estimated that at most, one in 10 victims report the crime. Government officials have reported an estimated incidence of about 120,000 to 130,000 rapes per year; but Human Rights Watch’s women's rights advocacy director Marianne Mollmann said the real number is probably closer to one million. In many states sex with a minor is only a crime if the child is “honest” and “chaste,” and in many states the age of consent is 12, 13, 14 or “at puberty” regardless of age. And the criminalizing of incest victims means that incest cases are rarely prosecuted. In 2005, for example, the state of Guanajuato investigated a woman for incest after her father, who had been molesting her since age six, reported her to authorities. The woman's husband told Human Rights Watch that the local public prosecutor threatened to arrest his wife on incest charges.

Women generally have little control of their bodies and sexuality; they are expected to submit unquestioningly to their husbands’ sexual demands. In 1994, the Supreme Court ruled that men could force their wives to have sex for the purpose of procreation. This ruling wasn't overturned until 2005. The massive increase in immigration, meanwhile, has meant many women are infected with HIV or other sexually transmitted diseases when their husbands come home after working in the U.S. and having unprotected sex with prostitutes or others. “A woman can't ask her husband to use a condom, because that would be like saying she had been with someone else,” said Mollmann. “The ABCs of HIV prevention: abstinence, being faithful, using condoms” don't apply for these married women because they can't be abstinent, they are being faithful and they can't force their husbands to use condoms."

A 2003 government study found that one in 10 Mexican women suffer physical abuse at the hands of their partners, and 46 percent of women over 15 suffer some kind of abuse (physical or emotional) in their home.

Mollmann noted that former Mexican President Vicente Fox, whose home state is Guanajuato, had promised the country would improve rape victims' access to abortion through, among other things, designing and enforcing clear procedures for victims. Currently, only three of Mexico’s 32 judicial districts have clear procedures for providing abortion to rape victims. But, Mollmann said, it remains to be seen what incoming president Felipe Calderón will do about the issue. “It's the state's obligation, even though it was the old administration that made the promises,” said Mollmann. “The international community needs to pressure the new government to make sure they follow through.” And Cruz said the larger battle is changing social attitudes, including attitudes among women themselves. “The church and the government control women's bodies, but women have no control over their own bodies,” said Cruz. “Abortion is a right, not a crime. We need to make it a socially legitimate option for women.”

* Kari Lydersen is a freelance writer whose work has appeared in the Washington Post, In These Times, LiP Magazine, Clamor, and The New Standard.

In the run-up to International Women's Day 2007, the memories of murdered women in Ciudad Juárez are being erased. Workmen have started clearing a portion of the old cotton field where the tortured, raped and mutilated remains of eight young women were discovered in November 2001. Located near the site of the new U.S. Consulate in the border city, the cotton field is suddenly in the middle of a hot commercial zone. New hotels and other establishments catering to the diplomatic and immigration services offered by the US government are expected to open soon for business.

Eight big crosses erected in memory of the murder victims mark a section of the cotton field. Now a landmark, the field is almost a required stop for foreign journalists, filmmakers, human rights and women's activists, and others who reclaim the memories of the young women. Mothers and other relatives of the victims hold memorials in the cotton field. For almost five years, Chihuahua state law enforcement authorities misidentified three of the victims as Guadalupe Luna de la Rosa, Verónica Martínez and Barbara Aracely Martínez, all of whom are now considered disappeared persons. Thanks to the efforts of the Argentine Anthropological Forensic Team, two of the victims were correctly identified last year as Merlin Elizabeth Rodríguez Saenz and María Rocina Galicia Meraz, both of whom vanished in 2001. The eighth cotton field victim remains unidentified.

“One does not forget,” said Javier Camacho, the new owner of the cotton field property under development. “It's sad what happened, but nothing is gained by the crosses, and one way of stopping this is by developing the border.”

Although the cotton field case and scores of other rape-murders in Ciudad Juárez and Chihuahua City stand unsolved, some local officials and business leaders have increasingly grumbled about the so-called “myth” or “black legend” of femicide that is allegedly giving Ciudad Juárez a bad name on the world stage. Especially within the last year, Ciudad Juárez media have downplayed the women's murders. A long-running website that publicized the cases of disappeared women and men, pesquisasenlinea.org, mysteriously vanished from cyberspace, as did the long-running femicide section of the El Norte newspaper.

Readers of major Ciudad Juárez news websites would have had no idea that Jennifer López was recognized by Amnesty International in a Berlin ceremony this month for her role in the upcoming Gregory Nava movie “Bordertown,” a fictional film about the Juárez women's murders. While JLO's award received ample attention in the Mexican national and international press, it did not even register a blip on several Ciudad Juárez news web sites.

Still, even the leading El Diario newspaper has had trouble swallowing the official story surrounding three men first accused last year of orchestrating the cotton field murders. In a February 18 editorial, El Diario questioned the authorities' case and recounted the long history of police fabricating femicide scapegoats in Ciudad Juárez and Chihuahua City. Late last week, the Ciudad Juárez press was also forced to report on a possible new femicide after the body of a semi-naked woman was discovered on the morning of February 23 in an empty lot near the city's international airport. Like numerous past cases, the woman's body was found by playing children. Although the unidentified woman was found in various stages of undress, a preliminary official report claimed she was not murdered. Neighbors said it was the second time that a dead body had been discovered in the same lot.

Sources: Frontera NorteSur (FNS): 02/25; El Diario de Juarez: 02/18, 23 and 24; Lapolaka.com: 02/23; La Jornada: 08/22, 08/24; Norte: 02/21-22 –
Thanks to Mexico Week in Review for permission to reprint.

[ORIT is the Latin American regional labor organization of the International Trade Union Confederation whose website is: http://www.oit.org.pe/sindi/e

This year’s International Women Workers Day has special importance because it commemorates the first year of work since the re-launching of ITUC’s global campaign: "Unions for Women, Women for Unions," which this year focuses attention on the importance of guaranteeing Maternity Protection in the workplace.

The discussion about the right to health care for women workers and their families was always a priority for unions, and in the case of pregnant workers, access to healthcare
services and respect for their rights is a priority.

The fifth goal of the Development Objectives of the Millennium is dedicated to "Improving maternal health" and reducing the rate of maternal mortality by ¾. Data from the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF indicate that maternal and infant mortality is often higher in developing than developed regions. In the case of Latin America and the Caribbean, 190 mothers die for every 100,000 live births.

The WHO emphasized that insufficient monitoring and attention to pregnancy and births later cause problems both for working mothers as well as their children. This situation reveals a public health problem, which involves lack of access to quality health care services. This is another form of inequity in the living conditions of many working women in the "maquilas," in the informal economy, women farm workers, ethnic minorities, domestic workers in domestic service or in part time jobs.

ITUC/ORIT defends the position that women should receive not only from governments, but also from their employees, all the protection they need for themselves and their children to be born. Thousands of women in the Americas unjustly support various
forms of discrimination in their workplaces to have a way to support their families.

Pregnant women and their children are exposed to multiple health risks due to pressure they suffer in the workplace, this ranges from long work shifts, to sexual harassment, mandatory pregnancy tests upon hiring, layoffs during pregnancy and loss or retention
of salaries.

Seven years after the adoption of ILO Convention 183 concerning the Protection of Maternity in the Workplace, it is important that it is ratified by more countries and that those that do ratify respect this convention that defends paid maternity leave and mandatory social security that covers prenatal care and care before and after childbirth, as well as hospitalization when necessary.

For COMUT it is essential that the union organizations include in their work agendas education about sexual and reproductive ights, healthcare at the workplace and the rights of pregnant workers, to avoid gender violence, discrimination, unwanted pregnancy and conquering of the complete benefits of labor rights of women. In
addition, union organizations should be committed to including practices of positive discrimination referring to ILO Convention 183 in their collective negotiations.

Employers who retain salaries, layoff or do not pay social security benefits to pregnant women should be denounced for violating the rights of women to prenatal care and assistance during childbirth by qualified personnel.

For this reason ITUC/ORIT considers that it is essential that governments define and implement effective health care policies that improve access, communication and transport to health clinics and focus on sexual and reproductive health. It is particularly important that these policies adapt to the reality of the many women in the informal economy and in atypical sectors.

In the same way, ITUC/ORIT considers it necessary to recognize the value of maternity as the base of social development and to guarantee equal opportunities for pregnant women. It appealed to all organizations to give priority to a union struggle committed to the rights of all women who are working mothers.

Marcelo Ebrard Casaubon, head of the government of the Federal District (Mexico City), has announced on March 21 that the Legislative Assembly of the Federal District will put forward the decriminalization of abortion by mid-April. He said that this position was consistent with the platform of the Party of the Democratic Revolution of which he is the head in the D.F., and that it is appropriate for the Legislative Assembly to take this action.

President Felipe Calderón stated that he was pro-life, believed the current law in the Federal District and the Mexican states was adequate, and suggested that more should be done to promote sex education. Mexico now includes sex education in its national educational curriculum beginning in elementary school.

The measure is strongly opposed by the Catholic Church. Youth from the ultraconservative Catholic group Opus Dei carried out a protest on the stairs of the Legislative Assembly.

The number of women murdered in the state of Mexico continues to rise sharply, according to a report in The Economist. Statistics released in early January showed that 188 women were murdered in the State of Mexico in 2006. The state forms part of the metropolitan area of Mexico City and accounts for much of its population. This represents a 12% rise since the previous year, and a 138% rise since 2001. Nearly all of the murders remain unsolved.

For several years there has been a campaign by women and human rights organizations to stop the ritual murders of women in Ciudad Juárez, a border city across from El Paso, Texas. Many believe those murders to have been committed by gangs involved in narcotics trafficking, but most of those also remain unsolved.

The Authentic Labor Front (FAT) has launched a campaign intended to expose the existence of and to demand the end of protection contracts in Mexico. Protection contracts, so called because they protect the employers from legitimate unions and real collective bargaining agreements, make up more than 80 percent of all union agreements in Mexico, according to Jorge Robles of the FAT. These contracts usually provide only the legal minimums already guaranteed under the Federal Labor Law (LFT) of Mexico.

Working with specialists in labor studies from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the FAT has produced a documented titled “Protection Contracts: a Product of the Federal Labor Law” which argues that many such contracts exist and that they do not reflect the will of the workers who are covered by them. The document in Spanish can be found on the FAT website: www.fatmexico.org. The FAT is also being supported in this effort to end protection contracts by the Inter-American Regional Organization of Workers (ORIT) of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).

While saying he would not privatize the Mexican Petroleum Company (PEMEX), President Felipe Calderón has called upon the Mexican Congress and the Mexican Petroleum Workers Union to come up with a plan to modernize the state-owned corporation. In doing so, Calderón has opened up a discussion which many on the Mexican left and in the labor movement fear could lead to the privatization of the corporation, despite the president’s promises to the contrary. The parties to whom he is turning over the responsibility for the plan have been implicated in corrupt practices in the past.

The Mexican Petroleum Workers Union (STPRM), headed by Romero Deschamps, is a notoriously undemocratic and corrupt union that was implicated in the “Pemexgate” scandals of the 2000 elections. The union is believed to have illegally siphoned off money to support the candidacy of Institutional Revolutionary Party candidate Francisco Labastida Ochoa, now president of the Energy Commission of the Senate.

Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, son of Lázaro Cárdenas who nationalized the foreign-owned oil industry in 1938, speaking at his father’s tomb called upon all those involved to come up with a plan for modernization that would permit both state and private investment. Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, the former presidential candidate of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) had long been seen as an opponent of privatization. Now he is directing his criticism at the government that has milked the state corporation for both private and political interests.

The National Democratic Alliance of Petroleum Workers, an opposition group within the Mexican Petroleum Workers Union, opposed any attempt to change the law governing the state company. The caucus, made up of workers from half a dozen local unions, attribute PEMEX’s problems to the failure of its managers to invest in maintenance and development. The Government of the Federal District led by the Party of the Democratic Revolution also opposes any privatization of the oil company.

Municipal workers from Connecticut and North Carolina who are affiliated with the United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America (UE) spent a week in Chihuahua with their counterparts in the Federation of Municipal Workers Union of Chihuahua. Between March 20 - 27, the local leaders from the U.S. met with unions in Cd. Juárez, Cd. Chihuahua and Guerrero, and attended a meeting of the federation, an independent body now comprised of 17 locals which represent 75% of the municipal workers in the State of Chihuahua.

While in Juárez, the UE leaders also learned first hand about issues on the border through discussions with workers in the formal and informal sectors, and visits to colonias and industrial parks. Of particular interest was a visit to a local hospital which attends to all but the most complicated health of municipal workers and is staffed by members of the union – one of the benefits won by the Sindicato Unico de Trabajadores Municipales de Cd. Juárez. The local was also pleased to announce that it had recently also won a 10% wage increase.

The federation is an affiliate of the Frente Auténtico del Trabajo, with which the UE has had a close relationship for over a decade. FAT co-president Benedicto Martínez expressed enthusiasm about the exchange, saying that it was educational for leaders of the federation who “are involved in a process of consolidating their unions and moving towards a practice that is democratic, participative and militant.”

The UE leaders in North Carolina were surprised to learn that many of the Chihuahua locals were also prohibited from engaging in collective bargaining (See previous article in this issue) and that the federation is also working on legislation to correct the problem. They were excited to have made a strong connection with workers in Chihuahua and are already making plans to invite them to

Despite protests by tens of thousands of public employees going on outside, the Senate voted on March 27 to reform the Mexican social security system for public employees, that is their health and pension funds. The lower house had voted in favor of the law the previous week. The law will replace the one common fund with individual retirement accounts. The Party of the Democratic Revolution opposed the measure.

President Felipe Calderón said he would sign the bill within days in order to prevent the alleged bankruptcy of the fund.
The demonstrations in the center of Mexico City lasted for hours, at times blocking major thoroughfares. Massive police force was deployed to turn away groups of protestors who threatened to enter the Senate. The National Union of Workers, many of whose members are public employees, had a significant presence in the demonstrations.
Several factions among Mexican public employees say they will continue to fight the reform passed by an alliance between the National Action Party and the Institutional Revolutionary Party. The ISSSTE, the health and pension program for government workers, will now have private investment accounts.

The National Organizing Committee of the Mexican Teachers Union (la CNTE) said it would organize a movement to oppose the reforms. A new teachers union, the National Independent Union of Teachers and Educational Personnel (SNIPPE) led by Teodoro Palomino, also vowed to resist the new law.

The workers have already brought hundreds of injunctions through the courts. Some union officials raised the threat of a general strike by public employees.

The Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca returned to the streets of Oaxaca, Oaxaca on March 8 with a mass demonstration of thousands demanding the removal of governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). The organizers estimated the march at 100,000 people though the Oaxaca security forces said only 8,000 marched. Whatever the number, more than 2,000 police were deployed.

Felipe Cruz, a spokesperson for APPO, told the press that unless Ruiz Ortiz steps down or is removed there will not be peace in Oaxaca, “not even in the graves.”

APPO, which was joined by teachers from Local 22 of the Mexican Teachers Union (el SNTE) called upon the Secretary of the Interior to fulfill the agreement with Local 22 and to ensure that all schools were open to Local 22 teachers. During the past weeks members of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and the newly created Local 59 of the Mexican Teachers Union have taken control of some schools.

Ezequiel Rosales Carreño demanded that the Secretary of the Interior enter into negotiations, saying that if he failed to do so the teachers would take the appropriate action.

Meanwhile investigations, reports and debates brought to light the repression of APPO and Local 22 that had taken place during the last several months. A report of the International Civil Commission of Human Rights Observers (CCCIODH) found that 23 people had been killed as a result of the repression by the Ruiz government. The group also accused the Mexican government’s National Commission of Human Rights of having attempted to minimize the repression that had taken place.

Editor: If you wish to sign the following petition, please respond to: freij@speakeasy.net

To The Men, Women, Children, and Elders of Oaxaca, Mexico, and the World; To all Organizations, Unions, Collectives, Artists, and Intellectuals

We are Radio Plantón. The voice of the democratic teachers and civil society of Oaxaca. On May 23rd, 2005, we began transmitting on 94.1 FM, as a free and independent union radio, that was gradually adopted by the Oaxacan people as their own; a people tired of media that only serves the powerful and their economic interests.

On June 14th, 2005, the government of Ulises Ruiz Ortiz sent the state police to violently attack and destroy Radio Plantón. In so doing, they silenced 34 diverse programs that addressed educational, social, and political themes; programs for children, programs about gender issues, etc.

From that moment on, Radio Plantón entered a series of processes: transmitting on the internet, and later with a small FM transmitter, whose signal was blocked by the bad government. We continued our work by offering our technical support and content production to those who participated in the unprecedented phenomenon of radio occupations in Oaxaca.

Today, after the destruction of what came to be known as the "Oaxaca Commune," we feel the pain of so many dead, imprisoned, disappeared, and persecuted. The oppressed Oaxacan people confronted their bad government, and those in power have sought revenge by imposing their "justice" on a long list of compañeros.

Today, Radio Plantón has finally found a way to get back on the air, on 92.1 FM and at www.radioplanton.net.

Civil society at the local, national, and international level knows and supports Radio Plantón. The support of various organizations, collectives, and unions, in the US and Canada, made it possible for Radio Plantón to acquire a new transmitter. The compañeros who have contributed their tequio (voluntary work for the community) by producing programs, are prepared to continue their work in the radio. More than anything, the fact that Radio Plantón is going back on the air is not the result of one person, or one organization's whim. The people of Oaxaca are crying out for it.

Radio Plantón is going back on the air with the goal of offering a voice for Oaxacan society, without the political and economic interests that drive commercial radio; a space for addressing social, cultural and education issues.

In informing you that we are going back on the air, we are letting you know that we want and need your solidarity: more than anything, your moral support and solidarity.

The below-signed express our support and solidarity for this project; a project for popular and citizen communication based in the freedom of speech and the right to information.
Oaxaca de Juárez, March 7th, 2007

Thanks to videographer Jill Freiberg for bringing this to our attention. - Ed.

The Trinational Coalition in Defense of Public Education, a coalition of teachers from Canada, Mexico and the United States has addressed the following petition to the United Nations in protest of the human rights violations in Oaxaca. – Ed.

Trinational Coalition in Defense of Public Education
Av. Coyoacán 939. Col. Del Valle. Delegación Benito Juárez
México, D.F. C.P. 03100

Re: Soliciting Justice for the Violation of Human Rights
February 22, 2007

Mr. Anders Kompass
High Commissioner for Human Rights
The United Nations Email: anders.kompass@ohchr.org.mx
Presidente Masaryk 29.2 Fax: (5255) 5254 2473
11570 Mexico, D.F. Tel: (5255) 5263 9892

Dear Commissioner Kompass:

The undersigned unions and democratic educational organizations of the Mexican Section of the Trinational Coalition for the Defense of Public Education in Canada, the United States and Mexico declare the following:

As participants in the educational sector, it is very clear to us that one of the fundamental requirements for the development of a society is maintaining full respect for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, proclaimed by the General Assembly of the United Nations – December 10, 1948 – and for the individual guarantees embedded in the Political Constitution of the United States of Mexico.

Human beings by their nature organize society which fundamentally allows them to defend their inalienable right to individual guarantees, as well as the right to protect their territory and natural resources from annihilation resulting from the imposition of neo-liberalism as a political economic doctrine.

In this manner, in 1994, in the state of Chiapas which is considered to be extremely marginalized, the Zapatista Army for National Liberation burst onto the national scene to claim respect for their rights and their indigenous culture. The response to this demand was a war of annihilation on the part of the Mexican authorities.

The Peoples Front for the Defense of the Land suffered a brutal repression in 2006 at the hands of the Mexican government for having stopped, in 2000, removal from their cultivated land which was to be utilized for the construction of an airport which would have benefitted the business and political class, attempting to convert the ejidatarios and cooperative members into sub-employed in their own place of origin and attempting to use for this purpose a fraudulent expropriation order.

The Democratic Teachers Movement in the State of Oaxaca belongs to Section 22 of the National Union of Education Workers. For the past 26 years the Section has fought to consolidate a popular alliance that would promote not only labor demands but essentially socio-educational initiatives that would benefit parents and students in a manner consistent with Article Three of the Political Constitution of the United States of Mexico and the General Law of Education. The state teachers have accomplished a series of pressure tactics including a labor strike to obtain a satisfactory answer, converting the historic May Day 2006 into a consolidation between the people and the education workers.

The insensibility of the state government manifested itself when it closed the dialogue and refused to establish negotiating spaces that could search for agreed upon solutions. This action was directly responsible for the interruption of educational services and harming the right to education for more than one million two hundred thousand students. The irrational decision of the State executive to dislodge the teachers encampment with the use of public force on June 14th fragrantly violated the right of free expression of ideas stipulated in Article 6 of the Constitution. This action separated the teachers and the people from the State and created a state of non-governability and converted the conflict into an insurrection of the Oaxacan people against its government and created, as a consequence, the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca.

The state government has shown its fascist face with hatred and organization decreeing a state of siege for four months unleashing a fierce persecution, jailing, torture, disappearances and murders of protestors, crimes that have been made worse by their hiding and manipulating their motives. The evidence for some of these crimes is presented below.

(A listing of the names of twenty people who were murdered along with their occupation, date of murder and the circumstances)

Due to the political situation confronted by our nation due to revelations about the presidential elections, the federation backed a wave of offenses from this illegitimate government by sending a contingent of the Federal Preventative Police and thereby breaking the agreements that had been signed by Section 22 and the APPO on October 28th.

Due to the urgency of the transition in the federal government and the necessity of presenting a panorama of social stability, hardly a reality, elements within the Secretary of Interior justified the authorization of a brutal repression against the people of Oaxaca through kidnapping, torture, jailing and the arbitrary detaining of students, women, farmers, teachers, workers, children, the elderly. In many of these cases the citizens were hardly even involved in the uprising. All of this flagrantly violated Article 9 that guarantees the freedom of association, the freedom to assemble peacefully and Article 16 which states that “No one can be molested in their person, family, home, papers or possessions without an authorized writ from a competent authority that identified the basis and motive for the legal proceeding…”

Ulises Ruiz Ortiz, state governor of Oaxaca and Vicente Fox Quesada, ex President of the Mexican Republic committed offenses against constitutional prerogatives through kidnapping, torture, imprisonment and unconstitutionally placing prisoners in jails far removed from their homes whey they had been apprehended with the result of keeping them incommunicado and hiding evidence of their bloody torture that was committed by repressive bodies of the state. In relation to this we present authentic proof of our word.

(Lists of people who were removed to various jails, some of whom have been freed, but are under provisional liberty and others who are still in jail)

In light of all this, in our country and in particular in the state of Oaxaca there is no respect for Article One that stipulates “In the United States of Mexico all individuals enjoy the guarantees authorized by the Constitution which can not be restricted nor suspended except in those cases and in those conditions that the same establishes…”

WE DEMAND

First: The intervention of the United Nations whose objectives are to preserve the peace and international security and to promote the respect for human rights and fundamental liberties of which Mexico is one of the signatories to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Second: The punishment to the full extent of the law of those material and intellectual authors of these crimes against humanity perpetrated by the state of Oaxaca and by the federal and state government.

Third: The immediate and unconditional liberty of those who have been jailed in an illegal manner in different jails in our country as well as those still subject to a judicial process even though they have been freed due to lack of evidence.

Fourth: We demand the appropriate punishment for those who have misused the legal power and position of the state to murder, persecute, jail, sow divisions, banish those who dissent by applying the law and the apparatus of power that was delegated to guarantee liberty, a dignified life and unrestricted respect for individual guarantees and human rights.

Fully confident of the impartiality and just orientation of this body, we await notice of your valiant intervention.

For the Colegial Coordination of the Mexican Section of the Trinational Coalition for the Defense of Public Education,

Pedro Hernández, Section 9 Gerado Estrada, SITUAM Arturo Ramos, STAUACH Raquel E. Cruz Manzano, Section 22 CNTE-SNTE

The death of a migrant child in the Sinaloa countryside has prompted a United Nations official to issue a sharp denunciation of child labor practices in Mexico. In a Mexico City press conference held this week, Dr. Jorge A. Bustamante, the United Nations Special
Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, decried the death of David Salgado Aranda, a 9-year-old indigenous child from Guerrero state who was run over by a tractor on the edge of a field near Culiacán, Sinaloa, last January 6.

Dr. Bustamante charged that the accident underscored how Mexico's does not enforce national and international laws against child labor. "The case of David's death is not unique," Dr. Bustamante contended. "This is an emblematic case of a very serious problem that involves thousands of children." Joining the United Nations official in the press conference were representatives of the Tlachinollan Human Rights Center of La
Montana, a Guerrero-based, non-governmental organization that is assisting the Salgado family in a campaign to obtain indemnification for David's survivors. The group is also calling for the punishment of the parties responsible for the child's death.

At the time of his death, the young migrant was reportedly working for the Agricola Paredes farms, an enterprise that cultivates tomatoes, cucumbers, chili and other products. According to Tlachinollan, the company is balking at compensating the Salgado family, using the argument that David's death occurred on a public road and that there was no written contract with the victim.

The human rights organization has documented the cases of 12 migrant children who died while employed in the agricultural harvests of northern Mexican states during 2006. The causes of death were attributed to accidents, drowning and exposures to agricultural chemicals. "The tomato that is sold in New York is the product of the blood of these children and of David," charged Abel Barrera, Tlachinollan's director. Since the beginning of 2007, two other migrant children in addition to David Salgado have died in Mexico and the United States, according to Tlachinollan. Besides justice for David Salgado, Tlachinollan is demanding that Mexico adhere to an appeal by the United Nations Children's Fund to protect young people from occupational hazards; establish a monitoring system for companies that contract agricultural laborers; create a national program to address the structural causes of migration; and comply with international agreements that Mexico has signed in the areas of labor, migrant and youth rights.

An estimated 50,000 migrants from the indigenous region of Guerrero known as La Montana, one of the most impoverished zones of Mexico, travel north every year to work for Mexican and foreign companies in the harvests of Baja California, Sonora and Sinaloa states. Many do not have work contracts or social security coverage. From last September to December alone, a program of the federal Ministry of Social Development registered the departure of about 10,000 migrants from La Montana; minor children under 15 years of age accounted for 46 percent of the departing migrants. Barrera said that the loss of educational opportunities is one major consequence of the mass
migration.

The U.N.'s Dr. Bustamante vowed that he will put an international spotlight on the widespread practice of child labor in Mexico. "It does not seem right to me that Mexican authorities presume that they are doing a lot for human rights when we have the case of David, which shows in a dramatic way how this is lie," Dr. Bustamante said.

Sources: Frontera NorteSur (FNS): 03/01; La Jornada/AFP: 02/27; El
Sur: 02/27; Frontenet.com/Notimex: 02/27; Proceso/Apro/Cimac: 02/26

This article reprinted from: Mexico Week In Review: 02.26-03.04.

The Mexican government’s special prosecutor has recommended that criminal charges of negligent homicide be filed against 11 mine officials and federal inspectors held to be responsible in the Pasta de Conchos mine disaster that killed 65 last February.

The International Federation of Metalworkers (IMF) sent a delegation to Mexico on the first anniversary of the disaster. Participating in the delegation were members of the IMF, the United Steel Workers from the Canada and the United States, the AFL-CIO and the Mexican Miners Union (SNTMMRM).

Grupo Mexico, one of the nation’s largest corporations with interests in railroads and mining and operations in Mexico, Peru and the United States argues that it met all mine safety standards and took all reasonable precautions. The IMF also offered its assistance in attempting to remove the bodies from the mine and return them to their families for burial.

The disaster has so far led to no actual changes in mine safety regulations in Mexico. ed.

Javier Lozano Alarcón, Secretary of Labor (STPS) has moved to put the issue of labor law reform back on the legislative agenda. But the National Union of Workers (UNT) and the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) and its allies in the Broad Progressive Front (FAP) vow to resist any change in the labor law that would weaken workers’ rights. Héctor Barba, attorney for the UNT said that the goal of the government’s proposed labor law reform would be to create a kind of “company unionism.”

The union discussion of labor law reform has led to calls to democratize Mexican labor unions. Augustín Rodríguez, head of the Union of Workers of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (STUNAM), said that most union leaders are elected by their friends in a cantina. Isaías González Cuevas, head of the Revolutionary Confederation of Workers and Peasants (CROC) said that the crisis of Mexican unionism is a result of the “corruption of some” of its leaders. He said, “we are at a stage where we must democratize the unions.” Andrés Manuel López Obrador also called for an end to “fraud” in the election of union officials as part of a broader movement for democracy within Mexican society generally.

Dear Editor,

The question of the relationship between the Mexican Constitution and international treaties is a tricky one. Your article did not get it quite right.

Article 133 of the Constitution establishes a hierarchy with the Constitution first, ratified international treaties second, and statutes third. The 1999 “tesis aislada” affirmed that interpretation by a unanimous (10-0) vote, making it generally applicable. This time, however, the vote was only 6-5, which—since 8 votes are needed to make a decision generally applicable—casts the previous interpretation into doubt. So it was actually a step backward for human and labor rights advocates who want to argue that ratified treaties (such as ILO Convention 87) take precedence over national laws. Miguel Concha explains this in his article “Hierarchy of Treaties” in La Jornada, Feb. 17, 2007.

In my opinion, the best decision would have been that human rights treaties take precedence over national laws, but commercial treaties like NAFTA do not.

Benjamin Davis
Director/Country Program Director, Mexico
Centro Americano para la Solidaridad Sindical Internacional/
Solidarity Center, AFL-CIO

Editor: Thanks to Ben Davis for clarifying this point. Our apologies to our readers for having given an erroneous impression of the decision’s significance in our article last month.

RESOURCES ON WOMEN IN MEXICO

RESOURCES – MEXICAN LABOR

Mexican Mine Workers - The International Metalworkers Federation (IMF) maintains a page in Solidarity with Mexican Mine Workers with Much useful information.

David Bacon Exhibit Opens at the UCLA Downtown Labor Center

“Living Under the Trees,” an exhibit of photographs and oral histories by David Bacon will be found at the UCLA Downtown Labor Center, 675 S. Park View, Los Angeles.

The exhibit opens on Wed., March 21 at 7:00 p.m. and continues through May 21. The opening will include a community dialogue organized by the Indigenous Front of Binational Organizations.

STITCH: One Year After CAFTA

STITCH Women Organizing for Worker Justice is organizing a language school delegation to Guatemalan from May 26 to June 3, 2007. Participants will tour Guatemalan workplaces and meet with workers and unions while also improving their Spanish. The theme of the tour is “One Year After CAFTA: Resisting the Politics of Free Trade.” Applications for the tour and for scholarships must be returned to STITCH by April 13, 2007, along with the deposit to reserve your space on the delegation. For information contact stitch@stitchonline.org or call 202-265-3790. The STITCH website is: http://www.stitchonline.org/

Mexican Labor News & Analysis

March , 2007, Vol. 12, No. 3

Introduction to this issue:

Contents for this issue:

Alert: General Tire Fires Mexican Union Leaders; Protest Letters Requested

Protest letters requested

Protest Letter Sent by UE

López Obrador at Second Natonal Democratic Convention Pledges Crowd to Resist the Privatization of Pemex

The Opposition Movement Alive and Well, if Weaker

Zapatistas’ Other Campaign

Bush Visit Sparks Protests; Calderon Defines Relationship

Mexican Unions March against Calderon’s Policies

“True Compañeras”: Women’s Role in the Oaxaca Movement

The Pots & Pans March

The Founding of COMO

True Compañeras

Violated Twice: Mexican Rape Victims Denied Abortions

Las Libres Defends Women’s Abortion Rights

Rape in Mexico: Crime Denied and Women Blamed

Juarez: Bulldozing the Memories of Murdered Women

Campaign for Materity Protection in the Workplace: Orit

Mexico City Gov’t Proposes To Decriminalize Abortion

Femicide in State of Mexico Continues to Rise Sharply

FAT Launches Campaign against Protection Contracts

Debate over Privatization of Petroleum Heats Up

Municipal Workers from UE Connect with Counterparts in Chihuahua

Mexican Legislature Votes to Change Social Security

Appo Returns to the Streets in Oaxaca, Joined by Teachers

Plea for Support for Radio Plantón: Petition

Trinational Petitions U.N. over Oaxaca Rights Violations

WE DEMAND

United Nations Official Slams Child Labor

Pasta de Conchos Mine Disaster Leads to Criminal Charges

Labor Law Reform Back on Legislative Agenda

Letter To Editor

Resources

RESOURCES ON WOMEN IN MEXICO

RESOURCES – MEXICAN LABOR

Events of Interest

David Bacon Exhibit Opens at the UCLA Downtown Labor Center

STITCH: One Year After CAFTA

Support MLNA & UE cross-border work: Donate here!

Support MLNA & UE cross-border work:
Donate here!