Mexican Labor News & Analysis

Crisis Shapes Mexican Economy, Politics, Labor and Society: Calls to Nationalize Banks and a National Strike over Fuel

The world economic crisis that began in the United States several months ago has now begun to impact the economy, politics, labor policies, and society of Mexico in profound ways. While corporations close plants and the government creates new programs to provide employment, opposition parties offer their alternative proposals and popular groups protest in the streets. From top to bottom, Mexico is being shaken by the greatest economic depression since the 1930s—with no end in sight. Truck and bus drivers have carried out protests throughout the country as well as a national strike over the rising cost of fuel. Retirees, furious over the bankruptcy of their privatized pension funds, have rallied in demonstrations by the thousands to demand that their accounts be re-nationalized. The Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) and other left-of-center parties have called for the nationalization of the Mexican banks. Meanwhile Andrés Manuel López Obrador, president of the so-called “Legitimate Government of Mexico” continues to call upon the Mexican people to overthrow their government or sweep its leader aside in order to end the neoliberal economic model and create a more humane society. We survey these developments here.

A Severe Economic Crisis

We turn now to look at this crisis in depth.

Strongly influenced by the crisis in the United States, the Mexican economy has begun to slide if not yet to collapse. Mexican stocks sold on the U.S. market have fallen in value by between three and five percent during the recent period while the Mexican stock market fell by two percent in the last few months. The Mexican peso has fallen in value from 10 to 15 to the dollar.

The crisis is expected to affect major cities throughout the country. Scholars at the College of the Northern Border and the Pan-American University have issued a study that predicts that ten cities which are among the major industrial, commercial and financial centers of Mexico will be especially hard hit by the crisis: Ciudad Juárez, Tjiuana and Reynosa, Ramos Arizpe, Aguascalientes, Puebla, Culiacán, Morelia, Monterrey, Acapulco and the Federal District (Mexico City).

Economy Shrinking

Mexico's gross domestic product fell by 1.6% in the last trimester of 2008, according to the Mexican government's Institute of Statistics (INEGI), the largest contraction since 2002. Economists expect the economy to fall between 1.9 and 2.4 percent in the coming year. Mexico's various economic sectors all fell by significant percentages: construction by 7.1 percent; manufacturing by 6.7 percent; water and electricity by 3.5 percent; mining by 6.7 percent and petroleum by 7.3 percent.

Secretary of the Economy, Gerardo Ruiz Mateos, predicted that Mexico might lose 300,000 jobs, despite a government plan to create 750,000 jobs through construction of infrastructure. Mexico has 3,528,926 female heads of families, and the National Survey of Occupation and Employment (ENOE) estimates that 35,000 of them lost their jobs in the second half of 2008. Mexico's official unemployment rate reached 5 percent in February, although this undoubtedly understates the actual situation, and many more Mexicans are also under-employed.

Foreign Investment Falling, Oil Revenues Decline

Foreign investment in Mexico has also dropped off dramatically. In the last third of last year it fell to US$124.3 million, the lowest since 1986. The trimester before, foreign investment was US$1,766 million. Foreign investment in all of 2008 was US$3,712 million, compared with 13,148 million in 2007. The marked decline in foreign investment affects the economy generally and especially job creation in Mexico.

Mexico's oil revenues, its largest source of income, fell by 54.2 percent. At the same time, Mexico's three other largest sources of revenues—manufacturing exports, tourism, and remittances from workers abroad—have also fallen. In the last half of the year the tourism industry lost 65,000 workers, or 15.7 percent of all jobs lost, according to the Secretary of Tourism.

Layoffs: Maquiladoras and Auto Industry Hard Hit

Corporations operating in Mexico have reduced their operations and laid off workers. The maquiladoras, most of them located on Mexico's norther border, have been particularly hard hit. The Juárez Chamber of Commerce reports that 25 percent of Juárez's 330 plants have temporarily laid off as many as 40,000 employees. In other parts of the country reports indicate that Vitro, the glass company, has laid off 800 workers; GM laid off 600 workers in February; VW cut 900 temporary workers in January; and Delphi, which has 50 plants in Mexico, including 15 in Juárez, will be laying off workers at its plants through the first quarter of the year.

Government Response: Financial Assistance

Felipe Calderón's government announced last October that it would be taking measures to staunch the hemorrhaging of jobs. The government plans to spend at least $4.5 billion dollars on public works. Other funds have been made available to help businesses, communities and the unemployed.

The government announced that it would make available $20 million to support maquiladoras that declared temporary shutdowns (paros técnicos) while keeping workers on the books. Some 60 companies have already sought the financial support and another 500 have reportedly expressed interest.

Financial assistance has also been offered to the automobile industry by National Financial (Nafin), the Bank of Foreign Commerce (Bancomex), and the Association of Mexican Automotor Distributors (AMDA) in the amount of 9.5 billion pesos or approximately 633 million dollars.

Government Revenues Lower Than Expected

Even as it is offering financing to assist various industries, the Mexican government has found that some of the revenues on which it was depending have fallen off. The new business tax (IETU) which went into affect a year ago was expected to generate funds amounting to 3 percent of the Gross Domestic Product. However, it has only succeeded in collecting about .05 percent of GDP, according to the Mexican Institute of Public Accountants (IMCP).

Altogether, Mexico's taxes amount to about 19 percent of GDP, as compared with the US where taxes represent about 28 percent, the UK where they represent 36 percent, or Sweden where they represent 48 percent.

Struggle Among Businesses over Government Aid

The Mexican government has also offered guarantees to national and foreign investors, funds to cover public and private debts, commercial operations, and other financial dealings. The government estimates that this will come to 74 billion U.S. dollars. Some of this is in turn financed by the World Bank, the Inter-American Development bank (IADB) and by swaps with the U.S. Federal Reserve for 30 billion U.S. dollars, as well as an International Monetary Fund credit for 20 billion.

Canacintra, the Mexican Chamber of the Manufacturing Industry, and other employer associations criticize the government for aiding the large corporations while ignoring medium- and small sized businesses. The commercial, service and tourist industries are also complaining that they have been neglected in the Mexican government's plans.

Opposition Legislators Offer Alternatives

The Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), Mexico's left-of-center party, is proposing reforms that it says would “break” the free market model. The PRD proposal would reform the Bank of Mexico to make it a regulator of employment; to normalize interest rates; to protect consumers; to pass new taxes on employers who now pay none. The goal is to defend the productive, academic and social sectors of society, says the PRD leadership.

Most important, the PRD and the Labor Party (PT) Senators propose to nationalize the bank, a proposal which requires the modification of the Constitution's Article 28 regarding the Central Bank. Mexico nationalized its banks in the 1980s and the privatized them again in the following decade. Today, Mexico's financial markets are wide open to foreign banks.

López Obrador: Overthrow the Government

Meanwhile Andrés Manuel López Obrador, head of the so-called “legitimate government of Mexico” continues to sharply criticize the government of President Felipe Calderón and even to call for its overthrow.

“Now there is more unemployment, poverty, crime, and violence, but everything that is happening is not necessarily destiny, it has to do with bad government….If there is no work, if there is no access to education, if there are not good examples among the authorities, if we do not strengthen our values, it is going to be very difficult to have social peace and tranquility,” said the former candidate for president.

Calling for changes in the country's political economy, López Obrador told a crowd, “…the people that manage the economic and political situation of the country, those who think they are the lords and owners of Mexico, we will overthrow them, we will push them to one side, because if we don't, they will lead the country to a complete and total failure.”

López Obrador's Program

López Obrador attempted to take his economic proposal to the Mexican legislature, but they refused to receive him and he was forced to hold a meeting of thousands of his followers in front of the building. He called for cuts in the government budget, funds he said which were used to support an unproductive and privileged bureaucracy, together with cuts in the salaries of government officials.

At the same time, López Obrador called for an increase in the budget of Procampo, a government agency which exists to support farmers. He insisted upon more funds for small- and medium-sized businesses, cuts in gasoline prices, assistance to the elderly single, mothers, and those with handicaps. His program also called for assistance to food programs, scholarships for public school students, and more money for health care and free medicine for those without social security (pension and health programs).

With the Party of the Democratic Revolution still riven with internal factional struggle, López Obrador has announced that he will campaign in the coming election with the PRD only in the state of Tabasco and the Federal District, while in other areas he will campaign with the Labor Party (PT) and its ally Convergencia. Exactly what this will mean for the PRD or López Obrador remains in question.

Retirees Protest

Many thousands, of workers and retirees mobilized by the Mexican Electrical Workers Union (SME) and the Mexican Union Front (FSM) rallied at the Mexican Congress in late February to demand that their retirement funds be re-nationalized. The private pension funds which belong to 60 million works lost 70 billion pesos (4.7 billion dollars) in the last year.


Martin Esparza, leader of the SME, told the gathering that his union and others would submit a legislative proposal to the Congress calling upon it to “re-statify” the pension funds, that is to nationalize them. “For various decades they have put our saving and resources amounting to more than 80 billion dollars in the international reserves, and now, because of the international crisis, out of the blue they tell us that more than 20 billion dollars has been used to rescue the bankers once again,” he said.

Drivers Stop Trucks and Buses

In mid-February, thousands of truck and bus drivers throughout Mexico carried out a work stoppage that interrupted transportation in many areas of the country. The press reported that the strike affected 35 cities, 16 states, and 25,000 vehicles. The staggered stoppages included strikes, road blocks, the seizure of toll booths, protests, and other actions. Thousands of trucks and buses were stopped and hundreds of companies affected.

The strike, organized by the Alliance of Autonomous Transporters of the Mexican Republic and headed by Jaime Soberanes, is part of the National Confederation of Transporters of the Mexican Republic (Conatram). A rival business association, the National Chamber of Auto Cargo Transport (Cancar) declined to join the job action, though it said it supported the demand to hold down diesel costs.

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Military Reports: a Sudden Collapse of Mexico Possible

The banks have collapsed. General Motors is on the verge of collapse. And the collapse of Mexico is not unthinkable. While Mexico's Attorney General Eduardo Medina-Mora told the press that he does not see the need for U.S. troops to intervene in Mexico, certainly the U.S. government, fearful of a Mexican collapse, must be contemplating its options as the situation continues to degenerate.

The U.S. Joint Forces Command, based in Norfolk, Virginia, part of the U.S. Department of Defense, issued its “Joint Operating Environment (JOE 2008)” in mid-January in which it suggested that Mexico might suddenly collapse, primarily as a result of the drug wars. The report asserted that “the growing assault by the drug cartels and their thugs on the Mexican government over the past several years reminds one that an unstable Mexico could represent a homeland security problem of immense proportions to the United States.”

The report went on to state that, “In terms of worst-case scenarios for the Joint Force and indeed the world, two large and important states bear consideration for a rapid and sudden collapse: Pakistan and Mexico.”

Since that report was issued last month, the violence associated with the drug wars in Mexico has continued at a level almost as high as that of the last year. The Mexican government now has 45,000 troops in the field fighting this war, with 7,500 now assigned to Ciudad Juárez alone, just across the border from El Paso. Human rights violations associated with the Army's presence continue.

Meanwhile, the economic crisis in Mexico continues to deepen and the peso continues to fall. While we do not want to contribute to fear-mongering, we should recognize that Mexico has reached a very precarious situation, where the government has come under tremendous stress and at the same time finds itself undermined by corruption. Collapse in one form or another is not impossible.

What would we expect to have happen if the situation continues to deteriorate or if a collapse should happen? First, the United States would not permit a complete collapse of Mexico, but would most likely intervene in a quasi-military fashion to preserve the Mexican state. What form would such a state take? A quasi-military, conservative government supported by the U.S.? Perhaps a government of “national unity” in khaki?

Second, Mexico would face the problem of both a flight of the rich and a flight of their riches. Mexico's elite would board planes heading for Los Angeles, Houston, Chicago, New York and Miami, waiting to see if and when the chaos at home would blow over. At the same time, they would become the sacadólares of the 2000s who, like the rich in the 1980s, began to send their wealth to foreign banks, deepening Mexico's economic crisis.

Third, Mexico's left-of-center parties, social movements, and working people would find themselves facing a new situation altogether different than anything they have faced in the 20th or 21st centuries: a quasi-military foreign supported government in power, a country continuing to be over-run by drug lords, and a deepening economic crisis.

Mexico's working people would then be faced with the question of how to force that government from power, how to create a democratic government, and how to fight to end the crisis and create a more just and equitable society.

[Click here to see the JOE Report].

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Drug Wars, Violence Continue, Narco-protests, More Military Sent In

The drug wars between rival cartels and the Mexican government continued with most of the violence taking place in the border states. However, the situation grew more complicated and controversial with what appeared to be protests organized by the cartels, more complaints of government human rights violations, and a new wave of mobilization of the military to confront the drug dealers.

Throughout February violence continued unabated, with the killing, maiming or wounding of drug dealers, police, soldiers and civilians in a series of assassinations, shoot-outs, and massacres. Altogether in the first 50 days of 2009, approximately 1,000 people were killed, a slightly slower rate than in the recent past. (Stratfor) Amid the violence was an attack on the life of the governor of the northern state of Chihuahua, leading Calderón to send 5,000 more troops to Ciudad Juárez in late February, raising the total number of troops and federal police there to 7,500.

Drug Cartels Organize Protest Against Military

A series of synchronized demonstrations involving hundreds of protestors were carried out on the U.S.-Mexico border on Feb. 17. The demonstrators, allegedly paid by the drug cartels themselves, protested the use of the army to suppress the drug dealers. The demonstrators blocked the international bridges over the Rio Grande at Ciudad Juárez, Reynosa and Nuevo Laredo. At the same time others blocked streets and occupied government buildings in the city of Monterrey and in the state of Veracruz.

President Felipe Calderón called the narco-protestors cowards, while the Archbishop of Mexico, Norberto Rivera Carrera, called them mercenaries.

Some of the narco-protestors raised the same issues of military and police brutality toward ordinary citizens that have also been raised in the past by Mexico's human rights activists and by the left-of-center Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD).

Military Human Rights Violations

While the narco-protestors and the cartels behind them may have seized upon the issue for their own purposes, there is no doubt that human rights violations by Mexico's Army and Federal Police remain real matters of concern. Brigadier General Jaime Antonio López Portillo, general director of Human Rights of the Secretary of National Defense (SEDENA), claims that human rights violations are not really a very big deal—since with 45,000 soldiers operating in the drug war there have been only 671 actions taken against soldiers for such violations in the past year.

Human rights organizations, however, argue that the Army is responsible for many serious human rights violations. According to a statement by the Mexican Academy of Human Rights (AMDH), the National Network of Civil Organizations All Rights for All, and the Mexican League for Defense of Human Rights (Limeddh), soldiers “have committed hundreds of serious violations; they have raped old women and minors; they have assassinated citizens at their checkpoints, they have tortured, sacked homes, and kidnaped people; they have illegally detained people and they have perpetrated many other atrocities.”

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

US State Department Criticizes Mexico's Human Rights Record

The U.S. State Department, in its annual review of Mexico's human rights record in 2008, found that, despite some improvement in its laws and regulations, the country continued to violate its citizens' rights. This year, as they do every year, some Mexican political leaders from various parties criticized the U.S. State Department's report, arguing that the United States hardly had the moral authority to criticize Mexico or any other nation. Others, however, argued that the U.S. annual review provided an opportunity for the nation to put its house in order.

The U.S. government's “2008 Human Rights Report: Mexico,” found that while the government did not commit politically motivated killings, “there were reports that security forces, acting both within and outside the line of duty, killed several persons during the year. A significant number of these incidents occurred at checkpoints associated with the government's efforts to combat organized crime and often reflected poor training.”

While there were no reports of government kidnapping, “police had detained [some] missing persons incommunicado for several days.”

Though there has been no legislation on torture, “Nonetheless, cruel treatment and physical abuse in particular continued to be a serious problem, particularly among state and local law enforcement elements.” And, “Prison conditions remained poor.”

The report also noted that, “corruption continued to be a problem, as many police, particularly at the state and local level, were involved in kidnapping, extortion, or providing protection for, or acting directly on behalf of, organized crime and drug traffickers. Impunity was pervasive and contributed to the continued reluctance of many victims to file complaints.”

[Click here to access the Report].

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

AI: Mexican Government Report Avoids Human Rights Reality

From Amnesty International

[9 February 2009] A Mexican government report about the state of human rights in the country does not reflect the reality on the ground, according to Amnesty International.

Submitted to the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council, the report fails to acknowledge the frequent lack of implementation or impact of the Mexican government's policies. It also fails to acknowledge the worsening human rights climate in many parts of the country.

Mexico is one of 16 countries up for review at the fourth session of the Universal Periodic Review Working Group of the UN Human Rights Council, which started in Geneva on 2 February.

“The government report's list of positive initiatives and reforms is good news,” said Kerrie Howard, Americas Deputy Director at Amnesty International. “The problem is there is no information on progress in preventing continuing human rights violations and ending impunity.”

Amnesty International has contributed a series of alternative reports to the current round of reviews detailing key human rights concerns in 12 of the 16 countries that are up for review. The organization's report on Mexico noted that:

* Mexico has so far failed to explicitly recognize the status of international human rights treaties in its Constitution.

* The authorities have yet to hold anyone to account for the 100 killings and 700 enforced disappearances that took place between the 1960s and 1980s.

* Mexican federal, state and municipal police officers implicated in serious human rights violations, such as arbitrary detention, torture, rape and unlawful killings, particularly those committed during civil disturbances in San Salvador Atenco and Oaxaca City in 2006, have not been brought to justice.

* The military justice system continues to try cases of human rights violations despite international human rights standards insisting these should be tried in civilian courts.

* The number of reports of abuses such as arbitrary detention, torture and other ill-treatment, sexual violence and unlawful killings by security officials has increased during security operations to combat violent criminal gangs.

* Human rights defenders, particular those in rural areas, often face persecution and sometimes prolonged detention on the basis of fabricated or politically-motivated criminal charges.

* Indigenous and other marginalized communities sometimes face harassment for opposing development projects affecting their livelihoods.

* Irregular migrants in transit in Mexico routinely face ill-treatment by state officials as well as sexual and other violence at the hands of criminal gangs.

* Despite advances in legislation to protect women from violence, implementation is weak. Reporting, prosecution and conviction rates for those responsible for domestic violence, rape and even killings of women remain extremely low. Two years after the adoption of the 2007 General Law to prevent violence against women, two states have not even introduced legislation to enforce it.

* Poverty and marginalization continue to deprive many rural communities, particularly indigenous peoples, of the right to an adequate standard of living and the right to development, in accordance with their own needs and interests.

“Amnesty International recognizes that Mexico's report highlights the open invitation to international human rights mechanisms,” said Kerry Howard. “And given the country's key role in the design of the Universal Periodic Review of the UN Human Rights Council, the organization hopes the government will use this as an opportunity to reinvigorate its efforts to address human rights problems in Mexico.”


[Click here to view AI Statement ].

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

US, Canadian Labor Federations Call for Renegotiation of NAFTA

The AFL-CIO of the United States and the Canadian Labour Congress have sent a joint letter to both President Barack Obama and to Prime Minister of Canada Stephen Harper calling for the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The letter follows.

February 17, 2009

Re: A New Prosperity Agenda for North America

Dear President Obama and Prime Minister Harper,


On February 19, you will meet to discuss many critically important issues. No doubt among those issues will be the need for our two countries to work together to address the current economic crisis and, in the medium to long term, to work cooperatively to lay the foundation for a more prosperous North America. On behalf of over 12.2 million

union members in the United States and Canada, we want to take this opportunity to raise a few important issues that we hope you will consider in this and future bi-national (and tri-national) meetings.

We believe that there is potential for the working people of North America, individually and together, to strengthen our common ties and participate in broadly shared economic prosperity. To do so, we need to address the worsening economic crisis in a coordinated manner, reopen and fix the flaws with the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and move on a range of complementary policies dealing with energy,

climate change and green jobs, industrial policy, migration and development.

Importantly, these problems must be addressed through an open and participatory process. For too long, working people in both countries have been excluded from the decision-making processes that fundamentally affect their lives, as decisions were often made in the backrooms of power among elites. We ask both governments to commit to address these issues through ongoing consultations that are open, inclusive and fully

transparent. This is the only way that that a progressive vision of North America will take hold.

1. Coordinated Response to Current Economic Crisis

Each day, we see more homes foreclosed and a catastrophic number of workers joining the ranks of the unemployed across North America. The recession will likely be long, and addressing its root causes will be neither easy nor quick. A part of the response will be domestic, as each government undertakes measures to address the economic crisis, such as enacting a substantial fiscal stimulus package to meet national priorities, including rebuilding our infrastructure and making a transition to clean renewable energy sources, re-regulating the financial sector, passing labor law reform, strengthening public services, reducing inequality and solving the protracted housing crisis.

However, the global economic crisis cannot be fixed without concerted international economic policy coordination. The U.S., Canada and Mexico can play an important role in that regard.


First, the Canadian government must move quickly to adopt a serious economic stimulus package to jumpstart its economy. The U.S. government must ensure that the recently passed economic recovery package is swiftly and efficiently implemented, with maximum transparency and accountability. Each country must take all measures necessary to increase demand in the face of the worsening recession. The current

crisis also provides an opportunity to reassess prevailing economic doctrines, arrangements and institutions. The international community must work to develop institutions and instruments that increase stability and equality in the global financial system. There is also an urgent need for reform in the governance of economic institutions beyond the inadequate steps so far undertaken by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). International institutions must also abandon the failed orthodoxies of the past, which have led to slow growth and excessive volatility in many developing countries. There is also a need for global cooperation in setting regulatory standards and coordinating policy, including addressing serious exchange rate imbalances.

We are hopeful that you will work together now to address these critical transnational issues that are crucial to a global recovery. The upcoming G20 Summit in April and G8 Summit in July present key moments to advance this agenda. In so doing, we urge that policy responses to the crisis be developed with the input of and participation

by civil society, which have for a long time raised concerns regarding the very policies that led to the current crisis.

2. NAFTA Renegotiation

The North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was sold on the promise that it would bring net benefits in more and better jobs and faster growth. While NAFTA did succeed in increasing trade and investment flows, it did not (and could not) have created more net trade-related jobs in all three countries, and those jobs that were created were often less stable, with reduced pay and fewer benefits, than the largely unionized manufacturing jobs that were displaced. Income inequality grew in all three countries. There are, of course, many reasons for these results; however, we believe that the corporate trade and investment liberalization policies embodied by NAFTA were an important contributor.

Below are our central concerns with NAFTA:

Labor and Environmental Side Agreements: If the benefits of international trade are to be shared fairly, workers must be able to exercise fully their fundamental labor rights. However, workers in each country have been systematically denied these basic rights for years, with long-stagnant wages and increasing income inequality the result. This trend has affected all workers, but has had a disproportionate impact on minority and immigrant communities in both countries. The credible exit threat posed by U.S., Canadian (and now Mexican) employers has further limited the ability of workers to demand better wages and working conditions in line with productivity growth. The North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation (NAALC) was put forward to address labor rights concerns on a tri-national basis. However, it has been an ineffective mechanism for the improvement of labor rights and standards in North America. Indeed, under NAFTA, labor rights have never been treated equally as the many, expansive rights granted to investors.

Similarly, the environmental side agreement established the North American Commission for Environmental Cooperation (NACEC) to handle, on a cooperative basis, issues that might arise among the three countries with respect to environmental enforcement and other environmental matters. The NACEC was also charged with administering a process by which citizens could seek official reports on whether or not a nation is effectively enforcing its environmental laws. The establishment of NACEC was a step in the right direction. However, sustained efforts to use the NACEC over the years have demonstrated that it has yet to grow in legitimacy or exert wider influence over each nation's willingness to protect the environment. It simply does not have the legal or political power to deal with the core environmental issues of the trade agreement.

If NAFTA is to be effective with regard to promotion and enforcement of labor rights or the protection of the environment, several, substantive amendments must be made. First, the obligations of these agreements should be strengthened beyond the vague obligations that currently exist. With regard to labor, the common obligation should be adherence

to the International Labor Organization (ILO) core conventions, as well as effective enforcement of domestic labor laws. Second, the dispute resolution procedures should be overhauled so that a dispute concerning a violation of any of the Agreement's labor and environmental obligations are resolved fully, fairly and expeditiously, with the same

remedies as any other trade-related dispute. Finally, each government must demonstrate the political will to act upon the findings and recommendations that result from the dispute settlement process. Failure to act upon those recommendations should be subject to immediate and dissuasive fines or sanctions.

Investment: NAFTA includes a deeply flawed investor-to-state dispute resolution mechanism, as well as overly broad investment rights. We believe that trade agreements should rely on government-to-government dispute resolution for investment disputes, as is the case for all other commitments. Further, the definition of a compensable investment is too broad; most types of investment disputes for which a government could be sued under NAFTA by foreign investors would not be valid claims under U.S. or Canadian law. Finally, arbitration panels have interpreted NAFTA's prohibitions on “indirect” expropriations and “measures tantamount to” expropriation to afford unwarranted and excessive protections to foreign investors. Government regulation that is related to legitimate policy aims such as environmental protection, public health and safety, consumer protection, the regulation of anti-competitive practices, and the protection of human rights and workers' rights must not be subject to challenge under the agreement.

Energy: NAFTA imposes serious constraints on the establishment of a secure energy future for North America. North American cooperation on energy issues must be guided by principles of sustainability (to avert climate catastrophe and safeguard energy supplies for future generations), solidarity (so that trade and investment in energy will

serve the needs of people, not corporations), and sovereignty (with specific regard to the rights of indigenous communities and national development priorities). NAFTA's energy provisions have been an obstacle to achieving these objectives and should be reexamined carefully.

Services: NAFTA restricts the ability of signatories to regulate services – even public services. Increased pressure to deregulate and privatize services could raise the cost and reduce the quality of such basic services as health care and education. Yet NAFTA does not contain a broad, explicit carve-out for important public services. Public services provided on a commercial basis or in competition with private providers are generally subject to the rules on trade in services, unless specifically exempted. We must ensure that public services remain in public hands, and that such services are provided by public employees. Moreover, in this time of economic crisis, the public sector can and should play an important role in economic renewal in both our countries.

Agriculture: Until the recent speculative run-up in prices, farmers in all three countries have seen farm incomes steadily decline, and more farmers forced to work at least some time off the farm in order to support their families and maintain their land. Farmers in Mexico were particularly hard hit, as domestic issues, such as increasing land concentration and the drying up of rural credit and technical assistance, combined with artificially cheap grain imports due to NAFTA, led to a rural crisis that forced between one to two million workers from their land. Manufacturing, which was supposed to serve as the engine of growth, failed to produce the jobs necessary to absorb the rural displaced and new entrants into the workforce, leading Mexico to export its workforce at an even more dramatic rate than before NAFTA.

The results from poor performance in manufacturing and agriculture have been that half a million people flee Mexico each year for a better life. Many others migrate to Mexican cities to work in the informal economy without benefits or job security. We urge you to develop national and regional complementary policies to ensure that farmers are adequately compensated for their labor and free of the kind of price volatility they have experienced recently, and that consumers can be guaranteed a safe and dependable food supply at more stable prices.

3. Complementary Policies

Climate Change and Green Jobs: We believe that we can have a strong, healthy economy, good jobs and a cleaner planet. Our response to global warming is inextricably related to the economic and environmental interests of North America. The development and deployment of the technologies and infrastructure necessary to reduce greenhouse gas emissions can also lead to a renaissance in manufacturing and trade.

If they are supported by effective sectoral trade policies, public and private domestic investments in sustainable energy infrastructure can be structured to create good jobs and ensure stable energy prices. To achieve this, each country will have to invest domestically to develop a national manufacturing strategy that lays the foundation for a new green jobs economy. This will mean promoting energy efficiency, increasing investments in rail and mass transit infrastructure, developing renewable energy sources, extending fair fuel-efficiency standards and introducing carbon-pricing to promote emission reductions.

Further, we urge you to work with unions and employers to establish a just transition towards a green economy. To support global sustainability and environmental goals, the governments of North America must join the world community to negotiate and implement action plans to reach post-2012 targets for greenhouse gas emissions.

Industrial Policy in Integrated Sectors: Rebuilding our industrial base is essential for maintaining our living standards. As high-wage countries in a globalizing world, we must restore our competitiveness by developing national industrial strategies centered on innovation. This means raising the level of public and private investment, harnessing

distinctive technological and organizational capacities and developing the skills of our workers. Further, we need to use government purchasing power and attendant social policy to renew our local economies, creating the conditions necessary for broad social inclusion. We can no longer pretend that simply cutting taxes and deregulating one industry after another constitutes a rational manufacturing strategy.

However, we also realize that, in many key industries, manufacturing has become much less a national undertaking than a regional one. The auto and steel industries, for example, are among the most integrated industries in North America – a phenomenon that long predated NAFTA and only accelerated upon its implementation. Of course, each country must be responsible for a national strategy in these already-integrated

industries; however, we should be thinking regionally to enhance the long-term competitiveness of these industries vis-a-vis the world market. This will require cooperation, both among governments and between governments, labor, and management, to improve productivity while respecting labor rights and improving wages. Canada and the United States have a shared economic interest in reducing our alarming trade deficits in manufactured goods, particularly with Asia.

Migration: The failure of neoliberal policies to create decent jobs in the Mexican economy under NAFTA has meant that many displaced workers and new entrants have been forced into a desperate search to find employment elsewhere. In the U.S. and Canada, employers, with access to a large, vulnerable and unprotected workforce of undocumented and temporary migrant workers, have undermined all workers by failing to afford the basic labor rights and protections to everyone. We believe that all workers, regardless of immigration status, should enjoy equal labor rights. Governments in all three countries should intervene forcefully to prevent wage theft, end ineffective and xenophobic raids, and stop abuses by labor recruiters. We also support an inclusive,

practical and swift adjustment of status program, which we believe would have the effect of raising labor standards for all workers. Finally, we urge you to review security and border measures that have limited civil liberties.

Development: Finally, economic development is a key part of the equation for a more prosperous North America. Together, we need to help stimulate economic growth in Mexico and in marginalized areas within the U.S. and Canada to ensure that its benefits are widely shared. Within the European Union, the Structural and Cohesion Funds provided a substantial transfer of investment funds to generate job growth in less

developed regions of Europe. A similar investment fund for Mexico should be provided within the context of a renegotiated NAFTA. However, in exchange, Mexico should agree to changes in laws and institutions that would allow the income of Mexican workers to rise as their economy grows. These would include guarantees for free trade unions, enforceable minimum wages, and an increase in health and education and other social spending.

We realize that this is a very ambitious list. We are working together to develop concrete policy prescriptions in each of these areas, and hope to maintain a dialogue on these issues. We hope that the U.S., Canadian and Mexican governments can make progress on this agenda.

Kenneth V. Georgetti, President, Canadian Labour Congress (CLC)

John Sweeney, President, American Federation of Labor & Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO)

cc: Felipe Calderón, Presidente, Estados Unidos Mexicanos;

Joaquín Gamboa Pascoe, Secretario General, Confederación de Trabajadores de México (CTM);

Isaias González Cuevas, Secretario General, Confederación Revolucionaria de Obreros y Campesinos (CROC);

Francisco Hernández Juárez, Presidente Colegiado, Union Nacional de Trabajadores (UNT);

Guy Ryder, Secretary General, International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC);

Victor Baez, Secretary General, Trade Union Confederation of the Americas (CSA).

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Wal-Mart Accused of Serious Labor Violations in Mexico

Wal-Mart, the multinational retail chain, has been accused of serious labor rights violations in Mexico, including unpaid child labor, discrimination against women, permitting sexual harassment on the job, and in some cases rape of its employees.

The report What's Cheap turns out to be Expensive (Lo barato sale caro) was produced by the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Project (Prodesc), and the Mexican Society for Women's Rights (Semillas), and by the independent researcher Shaila Toledo, and presented to the public on February 19.

Women, the report asserted, have to give proof that they are not pregnant in order to be hired, experience discrimination in promotions, and suffer sexual harassment by supervisors, including some cases of rape. Women may also be required to work 10 hours in violation of the law which establishes an 8 hour day.

With regard to the baggers who in Mexico are generally children under 16, Wal-Mart has adopted the practice of Mexican stores, of having the children sign a contract saying that they will work without pay, benefits, or health program, and receive only their tips.
Wal-Mart, with 895 stores in 141 cities, is the largest single private employer of women in Mexico. Wal-Mart will invest $808 million dollars in Mexico in 2009 and open 252 more stores there, creating 14,500 more direct jobs and claiming to create an additional 25,000 indirect jobs.

The study was based on research and interviews conducted in eight major cities in Mexico.

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Miners: Fight with Grupo Mexico Goes On; New Contracts

On February 19, the anniversary of the Pasta de Conchos mine accident that occurred in 2006 killing 65 miners, the Mexican Miners Union (SNTMMRM) and other unions and organizations held masses, forums, demonstrations and protest marches in various parts of Mexico. The union argues that the Mexican government and Grupo Mexico continue to collude to destroy the miners' union.

Meanwhile the union succeeded in negotiating contracts for workers at the El Porvenir company in Zacualpan and at Gold-Corp in Tayoltital, Durango. Napoléon Gómez Urrutia, the union's general secretary, living for over two years in Vancouver, British Columbia to avoid government arrest on charges of embezzlement, said that the new agreements show what can be accomplished when employers negotiate in good faith.

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Government-Teachers Union Alliance Still under Attack

Last year the government of President Felipe Calderón entered into a partnership with the Mexican Teachers Union (el SNTE) led by Elba Esther Gordillo called the Alliance for Quality Education (ACE). Months later, ACE remains the subject of mutual recriminations between the Secretary of Public Education (SEP), Josefina Vásquez Mota, and Gordillo, while protests against the program continue by rank-and-file teachers led by local or national opposition groups within the union.

At issue in the struggle between Vásquez Mota of the SEP and Gordillo of the union are not only educational issues, but also questions of wages and benefits based on seniority, academic training, continuing education, merit, and other issues. While the union and the educational bureaucracy struggle over the program's economic issues, rank and file teachers continue their protests.

In Puebla some 1,500 teachers took over 14 buildings of the state secretary of education, while in León, Guanajuato, 2,000 teachers marched against the ACE program. The Puebla Secretary of Education penalized protesting teachers for missing classes, leading the local dissident union group to break off negotiations and to threaten more militant actions.

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

University Unions Hold Demonstrations for Higher Wages

Several Mexican university unions, among them the unions at the Autonomous University of Chapingo (UACh), the Benito Juarez Autonomous University of Oaxaca (UABJO), and the Post Graduate College — a national institution with branches in various locations — held demonstrations in February to demand higher wages or engaged in work stoppages, and threatened full-scale strikes.

Some of the unions are asking for wage increases of as much as 60 percent, though Mexican unions typically make such demands only to subsequently lower them significantly. Most unions have been settling for wage gains in the range of 4 to 5 percent.

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Oil Workers Denounce Union's Leader

The National Petroleum Alliance, headed by Jorge Fuentes Garcí­a, denounced Mexican Petroleum Workers Union (STPRM) leader, general secretary Romero Deschamps, for his violation of the union's constitution. Fuentes Garcí­a asserted that representatives of all of the STPRM's local unions had met and decided to demand the removal of the national and executive committees in order to rid the union of corruption.

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Union Strikes to Protect National Archeological Sites

Three unions which represent workers at the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) struck on February 12 not for higher wages, better benefits, or their pensions, but rather to protect the country's national patrimony, its archeological and historic sites from being degraded through inappropriate use.

At the center of the workers' concern was the damage done to Teotihuacán, also known as the City of the Gods, through the “Splendor of Teotihuacán” project. The unions claim that the installation of 3,633 lights involving 6,575 perforations in the monuments could cause moisture to leak into the pyramids, palaces and other structures, permanently damaging the site of one of Mexico's early civilizations.

The work done on the site is said to violate not only Mexico's own 1988 law protecting the site, but also United Nations and Unesco norms governing such sites.

Alfonso de Marí­a y Campos, general director of INAH, has in the past ignored the union and its views. [See the article by John Ross below for a more detailed discussion of the issues involved.]

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

PRI Front-runner Invades City of the Gods

By John Ross

TEOTIHUACAN MEXICO (Feb. 26th) - The governor of Mexico state, the most populated and powerful in the Mexican union, and the early frontrunner for the once-ruling PRI party's presidential nomination in 2012, is striking a god-like pose these days. In fact, Enrique Peña Nieto seeks to annex the City of the Gods - Teotihuacán - whose famed pyramids of the sun and the moon are designated by the United Nations as the patrimony of humankind, to stage a spectacular tourist-oriented light and sound show dubbed "The Splendor of Teotihuacán."

The governor's designs on the City of the Gods are universally rejected by Mexican archeologists, anthropologists, indigenous peoples, the Mexican congress, and the citizens of his own state.

A recent visit by representatives of UNESCO's Monuments & Sites Committee (ICOMOS) to inspect damage wreaked upon the pyramids by Peña Nieto's contractors, has led to speculation that Teotihuacán is in danger of being removed from the roster of world patrimony sites.

Teotihuacán, 45 kilometers north of Mexico City, was first settled in the second century before Christ when newly discovered underground springs, a vital water source in this drought-ravished landscape, attracted corn growers to the area. As the vanguard corn culture in the Americas, Teotihuacán soon became the New World's first real city with a population of 200,000. To assuage the deities at the core of their cosmovision and maintain the agricultural cycle in balance, the lords of Teotihuacán undertook the construction of two enormous pyramids to venerate the sun and the moon - unlike later Aztec culture, human sacrifice was practiced in moderation and a benign and prosperous civilization emerged.

But after several centuries of extraction, the water source began to play out and the carrying capacity of the land collapsed. By 600 AD, the City of the Gods, plagued by marauding Chichimecas from Mexico's wild north, was virtually abandoned and the pyramids fell into ruin. Excavation in the early 20th century and a revived interest in the nation's indigenous past rescued Teotihuacán from oblivion.

Since 1939, with the establishment of the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), the City of the Gods has been transformed into Mexico's most visited ruins and one of this neighbor nation's top tourist lures. Now, to supplement the staging of his "espectáculo" at Teotihuacán, Governor Peña Nieto projects a tourist corridor to envelope the site with five-star hotels and world-class golf courses.

Opponents of the governor's plans for the City of the Gods decry extensive damage inflicted upon the pyramids by the installation of light and sound fixtures. 8000 perforations in the volcanic rock of which the pyramids are constructed to nail down the light fixtures have irreparably degraded Teotihuacán, charges INAH anthropologist Sergio Gómez, who compares the desecration to recent acid attacks on 23 two millennium-old giant Olmec heads at La Venta Tabasco by evangelical activists, at least one of whom is a U.S. citizen - the Christians claimed to have "a mandate from God" to destroy "these works of the devil." Damaging archeological sites in Mexico is a criminal offense.

Writing in the left daily La Jornada, anthropologist Javiar Arranda Luna accused Peña Nieto of entertaining the same mindset as the Talibans whose destruction of Afghanistan's ancient giant Buddahs earned worldwide repudiation.

Despite the outcry, Peña Nieto's contractors continue to occupy Teotihuacán. Bowing to public pressure, construction workers removed 8000 expansive screws holding down the light fixtures, further wounding the pyramids in the process. The installation of aluminum light casings on the heights of the pyramids is seen as an eyesore that violates the visual integrity of Teotihuacán and the sound reverberations from the show are expected to cause further hurt to this World Heritage site.

The script for "Splendor of Teotihuacán", written by a private contractor for the Secretary of Education that oversees the INAH, compares the building of the City of the Gods with Leggo construction. The lighting component for the spectacle has been contracted out to the transnational Philips Corporation, which won the concession to supply the bulbs to illuminate the pyramids - Philips has even patented a "Teotihuacán"-brand light bulb. Recent test lightings of the two pyramids transformed them into what one indignant INAH worker described as "giant jukeboxes" that could be seen from as far off as 14 kilometers.

Anthropologists and archeologists who oppose the project accuse INAH director Alfonso Marí­a y Campo of connudling with Peña Nieto and his state tourism director Alfredo del Mazo Maza, the cousin of a powerful PRI "cacique" or political boss, to promote the governor's presidential ambitions.

Enrique Peña Nieto's availability for the presidential nomination is also being flogged by Mexico's two-headed television monopoly, Televisa and TV Azteca. The governor is currently under scrutiny by the nation's Supreme Court for having ordered massive human rights abuses during protests at another Mexico state hot spot San Salvador Atenco May 3rd-4th 2006, during which hundreds of activists were arrested, two young protestors were killed, and a score of woman sexually abused by Mexico state and federal police.

In a message of solidarity from exile, America del Valle, the daughter of Atenco farmers' leader Ignacio del Valle who is currently serving a 112-year prison sentence as the result of the police crackdown, insisted "Enrique Peña Nieto will not pass over the City of the Gods - he has too many murders and other barbarities on his hands. The organization of the people will halt the profaning of Teotihuacán."

The unfortunately named "Splendor of Teotihuacán" is not the first time the City of the Gods has come under assault from the political and commercial interests of a Mexico state governor. In 2004, Arturo Montiel, who was eventually forced to resign amidst allegations of corruption, granted the Wal-Mart Corporation permits for a mega-store to be located in Teotihuacán's third archeological perimeter. Priceless artifacts uncovered during store construction were reportedly trucked off to a local dump and workers fired when they revealed the carnage to the press. Demonstrations by Indians and anthropologists grew heated and a police car was torched.

Similarly, Teotihuacán security forces have been deployed to suppress protests over Peña Nieto's putsch to turn the City of the Gods into what INAH workers term "Disneylandia." When the local Aztec dance troupe, Quetzalcoatl Naucampa sought to perform at the foot of the Pyramid of the Sun - Quetzalcoatl, "the Plumed Serpent" was a Teotihuacán deity - they were attacked by the police who claimed that the sounding of their "caracoles" or conch-shell trumpets would "damage the monuments and annoy the tourists." The Teotihuacan police chief ordered the dancers, who were in full Aztec regalia, to go home and "change into normal clothes."

Protests against the exploitation of the City of the Gods for commercial purposes date back to the 1960s when Mexico City scholar and writer Salvador Novo led the outcry against the use of Teotihuacán for the filming of the post-Johnny Weissmuller "Tarzan In The Golden Valley" - Novo's newspaper columns led to revocation of the film crew's permits by the Interior Secretariat.

Nonetheless, during the past decade, the mercantilization of Mexico's sacred sites has been routinely blessed by the directors of the INAH and Secretary of Tourism honchos as a ploy to pump up tourist revenues. Such fabled Mayan ruins as Chichén Itzá and Uzmal on the Yucatán peninsula now have light and sound "espectáculos" and are rented out for private concerts. In Chiapas, Mayan ruins at Palenque and Tonina are reportedly slated for the same treatment. An annual pop music festival at El Tají­n in northern Veracruz has damaged pyramids and earned the enmity of local Totonaco Indians for whom Tají­n is a sacred site. X'caret, the sacred Mayan "cenote" or fresh-water well on Quintana Róo's tourist-saturated Tulum corridor, features a hot-ticket sound and light show that has reportedly deeply degraded the site. But Peña Nieto and his cohorts remain undeterred, citing similar "espectáculos" at such world-class treasures as Ankar Wat and the Roman Coliseum as being big money makers.

As the showdown in the City of the Gods approaches, a thousand anthropologists, cultural workers, local residents, and representatives of indigenous communities gathered February 3rd, the 70th anniversary of the INAH, at the foot of the Pyramid of the Sun and arm-in-arm surrounded the great structure in a "human embrace." If Peña Nieto and his backers fail to call off the "Splendor of Teotihuacán", INAH workers have threatened to shut down all of Mexico's 111 archeological sites and over 300 museums. The failure of the Mexico state governor and future PRI presidential candidate to heed their warning and cancel this profanation of Teotihuacán, risks the wrath of the Gods.

The Author

John Ross remains north of the border dealing with medical troubles. These dispatches will continue at ten-day periods until he returns to Mexico. Ross's El Monstruo - True Tales of Dread & Redemption in Mexico City will be published in late 2009 by Nation Books.

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Notes about the Crisis and Unemployment in Tijuana

From the Red Maquiladora Network

The Tijuana Maquiladora Workers' Network has a monthly meeting the first Saturday of every month where workers talk about problems in the factories, their resistance and their organizing, and the solidarity between them. In the meeting this past February, the economic crisis is on the agenda. How is it hitting us? What can we do to resist it? Maquiladoras are closing or are laying off workers. Unemployment pervades the city. Mago, an ex-worker of a maquiladora and a labor adviser for the Information Center for Working Women and Men (Cittac) explains that Tijuana's streets are full of people looking for jobs. They are recognizable because they carry a folder under their arms—a folder containing documents that are needed to apply for a job.

The consequences of the economic crisis are catastrophic in Tijuana. The media is focused on the drug dealer wars, paying almost no attention to the long lines of anguished people who wait outside the maquiladoras, looking for jobs. The Tijuana government avoids speaking about this topic. “We must be optimistic,” says a government official (who has a job) on TV.

Twenty-five thousand jobs have been lost in recent months, according to official numbers of the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS), a government institution that provides medical attention to Mexican workers. (El Mexicano, Jan 8, 2009). This figure, however, does not include December 2008 and January 2009. The number of lost jobs could be as high as 40,000.

Maquiladoras where furniture and televisions are produced have been the hardest hit by the crisis, according to Jaime Cota, labor advisor and one of the founders of Cittac. Two furniture companies closed their maquiladoras in Tijuana in 2008, laying off nearly 2,000 workers. Both companies, Muebles Fino Buenos/Good Companies and Douglas Furniture left Tijuana without paying the severance pay they owed the workers according to Mexican labor law. After what's been a brave struggle, Muebles Fino Buenos workers continue fighting for justice.

Basilica, a Muebles Fino Buenos ex-worker and a Cittac member, is a young woman from Oaxaca who worked in this maquiladora for years. After she was laid off, she worked in other factories, but she was fired from the last one because she took five Oaxaca-style tamales inside the factory. Basilica has not found a job since November 2008. She finds the same line of 100 or 200 people looking for jobs at every factory where she attempts to find work. She has walked all over Tijuana in search of a job, and has become familiar with and an expert in getting around the different parts of the city.

Gesebel, another Muebles Fino Buenos ex-worker who is around 40 years old, also searched for a job. When she would apply, however, sometimes she would be told “you are very old to get a job.” But she did not give up and after a lot of walking she finally got a job in another furniture factory. The unpleasant surprise is the low wage—half of the usual low wage in a maquiladora. She gets $3, plus a $1 bonus, per day.

Workers and activists of the Tijuana Workers' Network tell stories of abuse. The companies take advantage of the recession to lay off workers, increase productivity, reduce salaries and erase benefits such as membership in the public health system (Seguro Social.) In addition, the companies are now requesting middle or high school diplomas before hiring workers.

Toña, an ex-worker of a maquiladora where ophthalmic lenses are produced, is an activist at Cittac and at the Feminist Collective. She coordinates the Collective Kitchen project, created as an alternative to workers fired by or tired of the maquiladoras. Toña explains her husband's dilemma. He is an experienced worker who, after working for a maquiladora for half of his life, was laid off and has not found a job that matches his experience and expertise. His prospects are now even worse because of the economic crisis. So, he has to take a job as a “helper” in a traditional Mexican mercado (grocery store.) But even there it is not easy to get a job. Hundreds of people arrive at 5 am every day looking for work. Only a few people are hired and only for the day and without any benefits. And they have to return the next day at 5 am to compete again with hundreds of people who also need work.

Paula, another activist at Cittac and the Collective Kitchen, also had to go to work in the mercado washing potatoes. For this hard work she receives about $2.10 per day. Paula explains that this money is enough to pay her transportation back home and to buy 2 pounds of tortillas. That's all.

Thousands of workers who received small severance payments after being laid off from maquiladoras have tried to survive by using their severance payments to start small street businesses. Tijuana is saturated by them. But small street businesses are doing poorly, according to Fernando, ex-worker of Muebles Fino Buenos. “Sometimes, one gets $15 [per day], sometimes $3, sometimes nothing.” “Unfortunately, many of these businesses soon go bankrupt and the workers lose the little capital they invested,” Jaime explains.

Many companies are closing or cutting jobs. Xpectra, a television company, cut 600 jobs. An electric fan maquiladora with 3,000 workers closed. One of its workers was due to receive $4,000 in severance pay, but the company only paid him $200. Samsung also laid off workers. And in the giant Sony, perhaps the biggest maquiladora in Tijuana with more than 9,000 employees, workers don't work and don't get paid one day per week. Everywhere it is the same. In RCI the managers had a meeting to inform the workers that they would receive pay for three days per week only. Workers refusing the deal, the company threatened, would be fired.



Mago told us that the Japanese company Sharp will cut 15,000 jobs worldwide. In Tijuana, the company canceled the collective transportation to the factory that was provided for the workers. According to some workers, Mago said, the plan of the company is to create problems that force the workers to resign “voluntarily.” This way they give up part of their rights to severance pay. The Sharp maquiladora is located far from Tijuana's downtown. People commute daily to Sharp from far away places such as Ensenada. Without collective transportation, some workers would have to take five different public buses to get to the factory. So, some workers got together and asked the transportation company to keep the collective service to Sharp, only this time they would pay for it themselves (instead of the company). Sharp's administration did not like this deal and prohibited the buses from going near the factory. Since the factory is huge, the workers had to walk a long distance from the bus stop to the factory entrance, but they kept going to work. Sharp reacted very aggressively. The managers contacted the bus company and the collective transportation was completely cancelled. “The company doesn't only want to force the workers to resign,” Jaime said. “The company cannot accept that the workers are organizing.”

Mexican government officials claim the economic crisis is not the fault of Mexico, but of the US. Yet, they don't mention that they signed NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement) and allowed Mexico to be vulnerable to multinational corporations. Even the World Bank says today that the Latin American country most affected by the economic crisis will be Mexico, due to imprudent economic policies. Years ago we warned that this situation could happen, claim groups like the Mexican Network against Free Trade. Mexico now has no mechanisms for protecting the economy against the chaotic movements created by the speculation of multinational financial corporations.

Now what? In Reynosa (a Mexican border city between Tamaulipas and Texas), more than 4,000 people have taken to the streets and blockaded the US/Mexico border gates twice in the past few weeks. The people protested against the layoffs in maquiladoras and against the militarization of the city and the abuses by the Mexican army (Frontera Norte Sur, Febrero 5, 2009). About 1,000 Nokia workers protested in front of the Reynosa labor board office. They demanded that the company give them their severance pay. Similar protests could happen in Tijuana. “Workers are furious in Evenflo,” explains Basilica in a meeting at Cittac. “Let's take flyers to the factory to educate the workers about the rights they have if there are layoffs.” Meanwhile, a new exodus is occurring. Most of Tijuana's maquiladora workers are not from Tijuana, but migrants from central and southern Mexico. Mago explains that many are returning home. “They are going back to being farmers,” Mago explains to a group of Pitzer College students who visited Cittac. However, according to Toña, this movement is an option only for people who have a piece of land to farm. “Returning to be a farm worker hired by a big grower has no future,” she said.

The call to become a farmer, produce food, and work with mother Earth is expanding in the border area. Students of Chicana/o Studies at San Diego City College learn about the Aztec agriculture while creating a milpa (traditional Mexican agriculture where corn, beans and squash are planted together) in the open fields at the college. Meanwhile, Zapatista activists of Tijuana discuss the best grain to plant in urban farms. The Zapatista Cosme Damian Collective (named after a young activist who was killed in jail by the Tijuana police) has big plans: work the fields, produce food, organize cooperatives to buy and consume collectively. A severe recession forces fundamental decisions. If the economic system has no alternatives, a new life style has to be created. It is a time for collective solutions. The Pitzer students left Cittac after eating the delicious mole (traditional Mexican dish) prepared by Toña. Meanwhile, other women of the Collective Kitchen are ready to cook the food for the next event.

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Labor Shorts

Some 220 doctors employed in the general and specialty clinics of the General Hospital in Morelia carried out a sit-down strike (huelga de brazos caí­dos) in mid-February to demand that their pay be brought up to the same level as that of workers at the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS).

Workers from Industrias Ocotlán, now closed for two years, marched in late February to protest Grupo Saba's unilateral decision to refuse to pay the workers compensation owed them.

Back to February , 2009 Table of Contents

Back to Table of Contents of Mexican Labor News & Analysis articles.

Archived MLNA issues.