Ten years ago, it was nearly destroyed. Today, its members are rebuilding through a new labor cooperative

by David Bacon

Mexico’s new President, Andres Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), probably the only head of state to give two press conferences a day and then post them online, is accustomed to having his statements cause headlines.
Last week it was a reporter’s question that caused a hot controversy, seemingly intended to drive a wedge between AMLO and one of his most important labor allies, the Sindicato Mexicano de Electricistas (Mexican Electrical Workers union, SME).

Reporter Rosa Elena Soto, of Acustik Noticias y La Neta Noticias, alleged corruption between Lopez Obrador’s predecessor and the union, over contracts for operating the huge Necaxa hydroelectric power station. “Many of these contracts have indications that they were plagued by corruption,” she charged.

In his response, AMLO called the union “possibly the most democratic union in Mexico’s history, until they viciously destroyed it in the neoliberal period.” Noting that its 44,000 members had been fired in 2009, he called for a solution to the conflict. Any corruption, he emphasized, wasn’t attributable to workers but to companies that took advantage of the situation. But López Obrador also called for consulting the discredited former leaders of the union, who had accepted government’s payoffs after the firings.

This response provoked outrage from the union’s leaders. SME General Secretary Martín Esparza replied: “We walked miles and miles in demonstrations, faced with dignity those who fired the workers. We did not sell out, even as our families suffered, and we didn’t just sit back with our arms folded and wait for answers. In fact, we proposed viable and novel solutions.”

That solution is a cooperative that has taken over many of the facilities where SME members formerly worked, including the Necaxa power station in the reporter’s question. This “novel solution” represents the union’s hope of putting back to work the thousands of electrical workers thrown into the street a decade ago.

When López Obrador carefully noted the union’s reputation, he was acknowledging the importance of its 100-year history on the Mexican left. The Mexican Electrical Workers Union, the oldest democratic union in Mexico, was founded in 1914 when the armies of Emiliano Zapata took Mexico City. Almost a century later, in 2009, the Felipe Calderón administration attempted to destroy the union and the nationalized company that employed its members. But thousands of the SME’s members refused to give up their union. Instead, they spent the next eight years en resistencia (in resistance).

This willingness to fight for principled labor policies is not only crucial to the country’s political left but has an impact across the border as well. Today, electrical workers in the U.S. work on an energy grid increasingly integrated with Mexico’s. To avoid the whipsawing and job competition familiar in industries like auto, U.S. unions will need Mexican partners with the kind of class-oriented unionism the SME has championed. That class-based unionism has a long history. In its new cooperative, that history is not only still alive, but has been adapted to the realities of an integrated economy dominated by pro-corporate reforms.

The origins of the SME’s class-based unionism

In 1898, the Compania Luz y Fuerza del Centro (the Power and Light Company of Central Mexico, LyF) was founded in Canada, and granted a concession by President Porfirio Díaz to generate, transmit, distribute, and sell electricity in central Mexico. In the middle of the Mexican Revolution, LyF workers organized the SME primarily because Mexican workers were paid much less than those working for the company from Canada and the United States.

In 1916, the SME organized Mexico’s first general strike. Union leaders were imprisoned and condemned to death, but their lives were ultimately spared after huge demonstrations. In 1936, the SME went on strike against the U.S., British, and Canadian owners of Luz y Fuerza. Mexico City went without electricity for ninety days, except for emergency medical services. The strike was successful and led to the negotiation of one of the most important labor contracts in Latin America. This contract preserved SME’s independence from the government, unlike other Mexican unions, and made it an important organization on the Mexican left.

In 1937, Amendment 27 of the Mexican Constitution made the oil and electrical industries the property of the state. Then, in 1949, the Comisión Federal de la Electricidad (Federal Electricity Commission, CFE) was established to provide power to all of Mexico-except for the area served by LyF. Nevertheless, private companies like Luz y Fuerza continued to operate under government concessions.

In 1960, the SME began to push for the nationalization of electrical power. The Mexican government subsequently purchased 90 percent of LyF shares, making it a state-owned and operated company. Then-President Adolfo López Mateos added a paragraph to Article 27 determining that the Mexican government has the exclusive right to provide electricity to the country.

The Sindicato Único de Trabajadores de Electricidad de la República Mexicana (Sole Union of Mexican Electricity Workers, SUTERM), headed by Rafael Galván, was established in 1972 for CFE workers. Galván, however, was expelled from the union for opposing government policy. He then organized the Tendencia Democrática del SUTERM, (Democratic Tendency of SUTERM), whose leaders were all fired. The union consequently became a pillar of support for Mexico’s governing party, the PRI. Since then, the two unions have represented the two poles in Mexican labor: an independent democratic organization with left politics, and a bureaucratized union tied to the PRI and the government.

(This article has been shorten due to its length. Here’s the link to read the entire article: https://davidbaconrealitycheck.blogspot.com/2019/02/the-rebirth-of-mexicos-electrical_7.html).

Numbers could go higher than 20,000

by Mexico News Daily

A massive cohort of prospective migrants dubbed the “mother of all caravans” is forming in Honduras, the federal interior secretary said today.

“We are aware that a new caravan is forming in Honduras that they’re calling the mother of all caravans… and which could be [made up of] more than 20,000 people,” Olga Sánchez Cordero said.

She didn’t offer any details about when the caravan might leave Honduras to start the journey towards Mexico and on to the United States’ southern border.

The interior secretary told reporters that migration and specifically the formation of the huge caravan was a central issue in talks she held yesterday with United States Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen in Miami, Florida.

Sánchez said Nielsen told her that United States authorities returned at least 76,000 migrants to their countries of origin in February and expect to deport more than 90,000 this month and a total of 900,000 by the end of the year.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a statement that Nielsen and Sánchez “discussed ways the U.S. and Mexico can work together to address irregular migration and the record levels of illegal entries at the U.S. southern border.”

Thousands of migrants fleeing poverty and violence in Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador have entered Mexico at the southern border since late last year as part of several large caravans.

Despite the federal government issuing more than 10,000 humanitarian visas that allow migrants to live and work in Mexico for up to 12 months, most caravan members have chosen to travel to the United States border to seek asylum.

Yet another migrant caravan made up of around 2,500 Central Americans and Cubans is currently traveling through Chiapas after leaving Tapachula last weekend.

Caravan members walk long distances through Mexico in often hot conditions but also try to hitch rides to reach towns on the well-trodden migrant route more quickly.

Sánchez said today that there is evidence that criminal groups are transporting migrants from Tapachula to the northern border in trucks and charging each person thousands of dollars for the service.

“…Imagine the size, the dimension of this migration flow, which is sometimes human trafficking by organized crime, the business of this trafficking . . . is several billion dollars,” she said.

“…Each migrant represents between US $2,000 and $6,000 for them…” Sánchez added.

The interior secretary said that authorities will seek to better patrol the entire 1,020-kilometer stretch of the southern border in order to contain flows of people entering Mexico illegally. She pointed out that there are 370 illegal entry points and just 12 official ones.

However, Sánchez said there won’t be any move to militarize the border.

Instead, migration checkpoints manned by Federal Police and Civil Protection personnel will be set up on the Isthmus of Tehuantepec to halt migrants who have entered Mexico illegally.

“…We have to make a response because there cannot continue to be hundreds of thousands of migrants passing through Mexico and arriving at the northern border,” Sánchez said.

She added that as part of the strategy to curb migration the government will no longer issue long-term humanitarian visas.

Irineo Mujica, a member of a migrant advocacy group that accompanies migrants as they travel through Mexico, said Mexico had stopped granting humanitarian visas “to comply with the expectations of [United States President Donald] Trump.”

However, Sánchez said Mexico itself is struggling to cope with so many migrants currently in the country, pointing out that there is an overwhelming number of asylum seekers in shelters in northern border cities.

Due to the United States government’s introduction of a “metering” system that limits the number of asylum requests immigration authorities will hear on a daily basis, migrants face long waits in border cities, many of which have high rates of violent crime.

Even after they have filed claims for asylum, there is no guarantee that migrants will be allowed to wait in the United States for their cases to be heard at immigration courts – as was previously the case – due to the introduction and subsequent expansion of the so-called “Remain in Mexico” plan.

The Secretariat of Foreign Affairs (SRE) said earlier this month that “the Mexican government doesn’t agree with this unilateral measure implemented by United States authorities” but continues to receive people anyway for “humanitarian reasons.”

Mexico and the United States agreed in December to cooperate on a US $35.6-billion development plan in southern Mexico and Central America to curb migration but critics pointed out that most of the U.S. funding is not new as it will be allocated from existing aid programs.

Secretary Nielsen traveled to Tegucigalpa, Honduras, today to meet with officials from that country as well as Guatemala and El Salvador.

The DHS said Nielsen and Northern Triangle security ministers have been working on “a first-of-its-kind memorandum of cooperation – or ‘regional compact’” – that “focuses on stemming the migration crisis at its source, including preventing the formation of new migrant caravans that set out to reach the United States.”

Source: Notimex (sp), El Universal (sp), Reforma (sp), The Associated Press(en)

In other news in Mexico:

Teachers return to legislative palace, block deputies’ access
Discussion of education reforms delayed again

The 2013 educational reforms were up for discussion in the lower house of Congress again today, but not for long: teachers once again blocked access to the Chamber of Deputies, shutting down all congressional activity.
Education and constitutional affairs commissions were to meet today and formally discuss the reforms implemented by the previous federal government, but only 20 of the 66 deputies arrived before members of the CNTE teachers’ union.

The meeting was called off and re-scheduled for Thursday.

About 30 arrived at the congressional palace at about 7:00am. Within an hour and a half, all the entrances were blocked by teachers and their tents.

The spokesman for the union’s Oaxaca local, Section 22, told reporters that the protest was in response to the failure of deputies to meet one of the teachers’ demands, namely having access to the document the lawmakers were going to discuss during today’s meeting.

Wilbert Santiago warned that “reinforcements” were expected to arrive in buses later today, and augment the protest camp’s numbers.

Last week, the Chamber of Deputies was shut down for 48 hours after about 1,500 protesting teachers set up a camp on the streets outside.

Then, as now, the teachers were demanding repeal of the controversial reforms, which President López Obrador has promised to do.

However, one of the most controversial aspects of the reforms was the introduction of teacher evaluations. Opposition members in Congress said on Saturday that about 80% of the reforms remain in the new legislation, including evaluations.

More protests by the dissident CNTE union are likely.

Source: Milenio (sp), Reforma (sp).

by Fernando A. Torres

Full of optimism were different community leaders who attended the ceremony of the “first stone” of a pair of buildings that will be built on the grounds of the 1950 Mission Street with 16th Street. The departments that will be built in the heart of the neighborhoods will be 100 percent affordable for low and middle-income families.

The project promoted by the Mission Housing Development Corporation and Housing BRIDGE not only marks a milestone in the brutal housing crisis that suffers the city of San Francisco but also shows that with the unity of various community organizations, it is possible to build 100 percent affordable apartments.

According to the community leaders who attended the inauguration event on Monday 18, the inauguration of this new building means that the unity and persistence of the community bear positive fruit and that solutions should never be underestimated from the grassroots, nor should hope be lost in the forces live from the community.

The president of the Council of the 24th Street Latino Cultural District, Erick Arguello, said that the project is also an example for the whole country that is possible – contrary to the predictions of millionaire builders (developers) – to build homes that are not at the price of the runaway market and that they are 100 percent affordable.

According to the executive vice-president of the organization Mission Housing Development Corporation, Marcia Contreras, 157 units will be part of two buildings; one of nine and another of five floors that will occupy a plot of 3,381 square meters. A family of 4 with an income of more than 70 thousand dollars a year could pay in rent about 30 percent of their income according to the Average Income of the Area / Area Median Income, said Contreras.

“The community had a lot to do when they had to raise their voices saying ‘we need more homes that we can afford’. This is their solution and it is one of the reasons why we are in this area today and we are part of this community, we are a community organization established more than 46 years ago,” she said.

Twenty-five percent of the units will be for homeless people, who lack housing and another 25 percent will be for people who live in the neighborhood of District 9. On the first floor, there will be a childcare center ran by Mission Neighborhood Centers; a bicycle exchange youth program called Bicis del Pueblo, ran by the Poder organization. There will also be space for small merchants and studios for artists. “The Mission is not The Mission without our artists. We will also have space for them, “said Contreras.

“It’s the effect of community work. The fruit of the work that the community has been doing for the last eight years. It is a great emotion to see this. When we were pushing for 100 percent affordable housing, they told us that it could not be done, that the city did not have money, that you could not build housing that was not at the market price, luxury housing. And they said no. But we did not listen to them, the community did not listen to them. And the community continued to work; We had a vision, a dream and this is part of the dream and it’s just the beginning, “said Arguello.

For the well-known leader of the Mission and executive producer of the SF Carnival Roberto Hernández, many Latinos have been forced to leave the Mission. “So many rich people who have come here and they are taking us out. This is another opportunity to keep Latinos here in the Barrio and in San Francisco … For me this is something historic. I am very happy because I have many years of fighting with many people for housing for the dishes, for the lady who is a nanny or who cooks and people who do not have the income to live in San Francisco, “said Hernandez, who Mayor London Breed named him the “Mayor of the Mission.”

Hernandez said that the main problem is the price of housing rents that continue to rise. Leasing a studio in San Francisco can cost up to $3,700. “Who can pay for that? It is a crime what they are doing and there is no way to control that. The only way is to build housing for people who are not rich. People have to sign up to opt for the homes we’ve fought here in San Francisco. Compared with other groups, Latinos are not registering, “Hernández warned.

Anne Cervantes is the architect in charge of the project. She proposed ideas and concepts to incorporate the community as a fundamental part in its development. In his 25 years as an architect, this project is special because it has to do with the eviction and displacement, “the eviction of families, the eviction of the homeless, eviction of artists.” The project will offer construction work to young people who will be trained by special programs in the city. “Never lose hope. This project means hope for all, “said Cervantes.

It is important “to identify cultural assets because if you take away our language and culture, we are left without a place. It is language and culture that create a place. To recognize this is to surpass the colonization of being assimilated to the American society. And that’s why we all love each other for our culture and our language, “said Cervantes.

Santiago Ruíz is the executive director of Mission Neighborhood Centers / Mission Neighborhood Centers. The organization will be in charge of providing pre-school services to more than 40 children of future families living in the building. Ruiz said it is important “to continue the fight. This project is going to be carried out because there was always a strong voice from the community, which did not ask, but instead claimed. And it was through this claim that someone heard, he paid attention to us and followed the necessary steps so that those 150 families can live here, “Ruíz said.

At a cost of 105 million dollars, the project is expected to be completed in 2020. In the Mission District, eight affordable housing projects are in progress. The works have already begun in four of the sites; at 3001 Calle 24, 681 Florida Street and in 1990 Folsom Street. It is expected that the building of 82 affordable units in 490 Van Ness del Sur will also be completed in 2020.

NOTE:
One of the organizations that helps to fill out applications and forms for free is MEDA, Mission Economic Development Agency 415-282-3334 ext. 126;

Court documents reveal stunning scheme used to trap 161 foreign nationals; Ice maintains the students knew the school was fake

by Amanda Holpuch

The University of Farmington website described a college that would prepare students to succeed in an “ever-globalizing economy”. Students would show up at campus wearing backpacks and asking questions about classes. The US government listed Farmington as eligible to enroll foreign students. The school president, whose LinkedIn page is still online, sent emails to students describing his institution as “a nationally accredited institution authorized to enroll international students”.

But it was all a sham to snare immigrants.

Court documents unsealed last month unveiled a stunning scheme by the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to create a fake university – with no classes or professors, just a staff of undercover agents who went on to build a case that has seen 161 foreign nationals arrested.

“These are students who are trying to make their lives better, these are not criminals, these are not people who are here leeching off the system,” said Amer Zahr, an adjunct professor of law at the University of Detroit-Mercy and a spokesman for Najlaa Krim Musarsa, one of the students arrested.

Musarsa, a 29-year-old woman from Palestine, was one of those arrested without trial for civil immigration violations because she enrolled in the university, located just outside of Detroit in Farmington Hills, Michigan. Eight other people were charged with criminal violations and are accused of helping enroll the students in exchange for cash, kickbacks and tuition credits from February 2017 to January 2019.

Attorneys and civil rights advocates emphasize there is a stark line between the eight indicted on criminal charges and the students arrested on civil charges.

“Everyone was taken completely by surprise,” Zahr said. “There was no warning of this action. There was no notice given to her [Musarsa] that she was out of status, that this university was fake.”

Most of the students were Indian and the country’s government issued a rare “démarche” to the US embassy in New Delhi stating the government needed immediate access to the detainees. As of 5 February, India consular officials had visited 36 different detention centers across the US and created a 24/7 hotline for impacted students.

Since the indictment was unsealed on 30 January, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) has maintained each of the more than 600 people enrolled at the University of Farmington knew they would not attend real classes or earn credits. “Their intent was to fraudulently maintain their student visa status and to obtain work authorization,” the indictment said.

Faiza Patel, the codirector of the liberty and national security program at New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice, said it was not 100% clear that every student knew what they were getting into.
“Normally, we would like our law enforcement agencies to be investigating crimes that are already occurring as opposed to spending time and resources in creating elaborate sting operations,” said Patel.

Patel noted Ice has been under fire in recent years for its aggressive immigration enforcement tactics, which target criminals and people who have civil immigration violations in equal measure.
“It’s an open question as to whether this is the best use of Ice’s resources,” Patel said. “I think these days we have a lot of open questions about whether the way Ice is responding is a logical response to the problems this country faces.”

At the University of Farmington, federal agents posed as school officials in emails and registered the school with the state of Michigan, according to emails obtained by the Detroit Free Press. Workers at the building listed as University of Farmington’s location told local news channel WXYZ that students would come in asking what time the school opened and closed and complained they had trouble getting in touch with school representatives.

The undercover operation was led by the nation’s second largest investigative agency, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), which is one of the three branches of Ice. A 2008 Ice handbook leaked last year showed that while undercover agents are advised not to induce people to commit crimes, exceptions can be made and are internally regulated.

This is not the first sham university created by Ice. In 2016, the agency announced the University of Northern New Jersey was not a legitimate school and its only employees were undercover agents. Then, too, the government insisted the more than 1,000 students were aware they were participating in a fraud. About 20 brokers were also arrested for recruiting students.

Angelo Guisado, the staff attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights, said DHS carried out the operation aware that it could send hundreds of people to immigration courts, which do not have the same constitutional protections as other courts.

“Ice knowing this or DHS knowing this tries to ensnare as many people as possible and get them wound up in an immigration system where they know that the cards are going to be stacked against the immigrant,” Guisado said.

He cautioned that creating a sham university was in line with other tactics used by Ice, such as its habit also revealed last month of creating fake court dates for immigration hearings.
Guisado said: “This is not the first fake university that DHS created and I don’t think it will be the last.”

8-billion-peso infrastructure program announced for leading tourism destinations

by Mexico News Daily

Putting an end to the “offensive” contrast between luxurious hotels and poor neighborhoods in Mexico’s most popular resort cities is the aim of a new government program launched yesterday by President López Obrador.

The central objective of the Mi México Late (My Mexico Beats) program is to build much-needed infrastructure in the working-class neighborhoods of Mexico’s leading tourism destinations.

“We no longer want there to be the offensive contrast between large hotels and marginalized, impoverished neighborhoods without water services, without drainage, without anything,” López Obrador said yesterday in Los Cabos, Baja California Sur.

Among the cities that will benefit from the 8-billion-peso (US $413.7-million) urban improvement program are Los Cabos, Cancún, Acapulco and Puerto Vallarta.

Urban Development Secretary Román Meyer Falcón said that 10 northern border cities will also receive funding for infrastructure projects through the same program.

López Obrador said the government chose to launch the program in Los Cabos because of its importance to tourism in the country.

Almost 600 million pesos (US $31 million) will be allocated to infrastructure projects in the city’s neighborhoods, he said, explaining that residents will also be able to access financial support in order to obtain deeds for their properties.

The president also said that a 1-billion-peso (US $51.7-million) water desalination plant has been authorized for the area.

López Obrador pledged to return to Los Cabos in a few months to assess the progress of the Mi México Late program and other government initiatives.

“Mexico has a lot of natural resources, a lot of wealth, good people, hard-working people. What was needed, we now have: a good government,” he said.

Meanwhile, López Obrador announced today that his government is planning to launch a tidy towns contest to encourage people to take more pride in the places where they live.

“We have to take care of the cleanliness of our towns … no to garbage, no to dirtiness . . . [societal] transformation also implies cleanliness,” he said.

After waxing lyrical about the beauty of the bougainvillea plant, the president explained that the cleanest, best-decorated towns in Mexico will be officially recognized at an awards ceremony at the National Palace.

A public infrastructure project that each winning town needs will also probably be part of the prize package, López Obrador said.

“There are very poor towns with humble people but they’re very clean. For example, I know all the municipalities of Oaxaca and they’re very clean, they’re careful not to contaminate the water, there are signs … so that people don’t throw detergent and fertilizer into the streams, there are trash cans, that is also very important.”

In other tourism news in Mexico:

Hospitality-travel firm says tourists with money are going elsewhere

Head of Apple Leisure Group says insecurity, sargassum and insufficient marketing are the causes

Mexico’s high-end tourism market has taken a hit so far in 2019, according to the CEO of a hospitality-travel firm who predicts that visitor numbers will decline further in coming months.

Alejandro Zozaya, CEO of Apple Leisure Group, estimates that the economic spillover from tourism is down 20 percent to date this year compared to the same period of 2018.

The problem: not as many wealthy Americans are coming to Mexico to vacation, get married at lavish ceremonies and honeymoon.

“The most important market we have lost is that which leaves the largest economic spillover, the high-end North American,” Zozaya told the news outlet Aristegui Noticias.

“We still have a lot of Americans but the highest segment [of the market] has stopped coming and we’ve replaced them with tourists from other countries and regions who leave a smaller spillover – they spend less at the destination, hotel rates go down,” he said.

The businessman claimed that the main reason well-off tourists are not coming to Mexico is insecurity but added that sargassum on Caribbean coast beaches and a lack of marketing following the government’s decision to disband the Tourism Promotion Council (CPTM) are also factors.

More United States citizens are traveling outside their country than ever before and there is not a decline in the international tourism market, but tourists are deciding to “go to other destinations that are not Mexico,” Zozaya said.

“[Americans] are going to the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Jamaica, and Mexico loses market share.”

He said that tourism is declining in Mexico’s most popular destinations at the same as the number of hotel rooms is going up.

“We have 30,000 additional rooms projected for Quintana Roo on top of those in Puerto Vallarta, in Los Cabos and other destinations in Mexico,” Zozaya said.

He stressed that advertising is the best way to attract greater visitor numbers to Mexico and that demand for accommodation and other tourism services must grow at a rate at least equal to supply growth in order to maintain profitability and employment in the sector.

Zozaya’s estimate of a 20 percent reduction in tourism spending this year is well above the 0.3 percent decline in air arrivals recorded in January but the businessman warned that “the most complicated” period for the tourism industry “is still to come.”

Contributing to the decline in international air arrivals in January was a reduction in the number of passengers flying into Cancún International Airport, the first year-over-year decrease for any month in almost seven years.

Earlier this year, the Secretariat of Tourism predicted that international visitor numbers could hit 43.6 million in 2019, which would represent a 5.2 percent increase on last year’s record figures.
Total tourism expenditure is forecast to reach just under US $23.7 billion, which would also be 5.2 percent higher than in 2018.

Last month, Tourism Secretary Miguel Torruco Marqués said the government is aiming to increase expenditure by tourists in Mexico by focusing more on attracting big spenders.

Among the nationalities that spend the most while visiting Mexico, the Japanese are in first place, spending an average of $2,008, not including airfare.

Source: Aristegui Noticias (sp.