AUT: Mex Labor News, Sept 2, Part 2

[Dan La Botz <103144.2651@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

          MEXICAN LABOR NEWS AND ANALYSIS
            PART 2, BE SURE THAT YOU HAVE PART 1
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          ELECTRICAL WORKERS AND ALLIES MARCH AGAINST
 PRIVATIZATION OF ELECTRIC POWER INDUSTRY

     Tens of thousands of electrical workers and their allies
marched through Mexico City to the Zocalo, the national plaza, in
a massive demonstration against the privatization of the electric
power industry on August 28.

     The demonstration included the Mexican Electrical Workers
(SME) and five thousand dissidents from the Sole Union of
Electrical Workers (SUTERM), as well as supporters from the
National Union of Workers (UNT), the May First Inter-Union Group
(CIPM), and the Mexican Union Front (FSM). In addition the
coordinating committee of the strike at the National Autonomous
University of Mexico (UNAM) mobilized several thousand students
who also joined the march.

               Challenge to Rodriguez Alacine and CTM

     Early this year President Ernesto Zedillo proposed amending
the Mexican Constitution to permit the privatization of the
electric power industry. But the SME and its allies built a
movement that effectively stopped the privatization plan during
the last legislative period, the first such major union victory
on this sort of issue in almost 15 years.

     The participation in the August 28 demonstration of 5,000
SUTERM members represents a direct challenge to the authority of
Leonardo Rodriguez Alcaine, general secretary of SUTERM, head of
the Confederation of Mexican Workers (CTM), and president of the
Congress of Labor. Rodriguez Alcaine, SUTERM and the CTM have
supported the privatization of the electrical industry, while the
SME and the UNT have opposed it.

     The privatization issue has deeply divided SUTERM, leading
to a rank and file rebellion against Rodriguez Alcaine and other
union officials who support Zedillo's plan. Dozens of SUTERM
locals have turned against the CTM chief, and many have organized
protests at SUTERM offices demanding that Rodriguez Alcaine
resign.

               Hemispheric Front Against Privatization

     In the course of this campaign, Mexican Electrical Workers
Union (SME) and dissidents in the Sole Union of Electrical
Workers (SUTERM) have overcome a 20-year long division and joined
together to resist Zedillo's privatization project which
threatens their unions, contracts, and jobs. Several months ago
SME and other labor organizations created the National Front of
Resistance Against the Privatization of the electrical Industrie
(FNRCPIE).

     Now SME and its allies are launching a Hemispheric Front
against Privatization with the support of unions from Brazil,
Argentine, and several other Latin American countries. The new
Hemispheric Front will hold an international seminar in
September.

     The parliamentary delegation of the Party of the Democratic
Revolution (PRD) which supports the SME in its fight against
privatization has raised the idea of a national "consulta" or
referendum on the issue.

                              ###

     TAESA TRIES TO MAKE DEAL WITH FLGHT ATTENDANTS UNION

     TAESA, the Spanish acronym of Executive Transport Airlines,
fired more than 100 workers between March and July because they
supported the Union Association of Aviation Flight Attendants
(ASSA). The Flight Attendants union, ASSA, has responded by
leafleting customers in the Mexico City International Airport.
Because the union's leaflets have been hurting business, TAESA
wants to make a deal, offering fired employees "a generous
severance payment." But the deal has not been accepted by the
union.

     The problems began back in March when TAESA employees voted
on whether to affiliate with the flight attendants union or with
a general airline workers union controlled by the Confederation
of Mexican Workers (CTM). The CTM claimed victory, but the
Federal Board of Conciliation and Arbitration never handed down a
decision. Meanwhile the company fired over 100 ASSA loyalists.

     Alejandra Barrales, head of ASSA, says the union is fighting
for a new election which would permit flight attendants to vote
to affiliate with her union. The fired TAESA employees have had
support from ASSA members from Aeromexico and Mexicana airlines,
and leafletting in the airport has continued.

                              ###

               MAQUILADORA WAGES DROP 23 PERCENT
                    IN LAST FIVE YEARS

     Today Mexico has about 4,000 maquiladoras, manufacturing,
assembly, and packing plants, employing just over one million
workers, almost 60 percent of them women. Since the negotiation
of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) five years
ago, those workers? wages have fallen 23 percent, according to
both Mexican and U.S. investigators. Most Mexican workers make
about one-tenth of the wages of a U.S. worker doing the same sort
of work, according to Laura Juarez, an investigator associated
with the Workers University of Mexico (UOM) speaking at a recent
conference in Mexico City.

     Juarez asserts that Mexican wages are among the lowest in
the world, including lower than poor countries of Latin America
such as El Salvador, Honduras and Ecuador, or Asian nations such
as Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapur where pay varies between
US$4.83 and 5.16 per day. Mexican maquiladora workers? wages
often fall below US$4.50 per day.

     Tim Beaty of the AFL-CIO?s Solidarity Center office in
Mexico argues that Mexico?s economic model oriented toward
export and developed in accord with the North American Free Trade
Agreement (NAFTA) rules makes developing countries more
susceptible to international economic adjustments, as happened
during the recent crisis in the Asian countries, which had also
based their economic growth on the export model.

     Beaty suggests that the problems of the maquiladoras are
intimately related to other issues, such as the lack of capital
and the poverty in the Mexican countryside, leading thousands of
rural workers to migrate north across the border into the United
States in search of a job and income.

      That?s why it is important to renegotiate NAFTA, and that
workers participate in the process,  says Beaty.

                              ###

          FARM WORKERS "RIOT" AGAIN IN SAN QUINTIN;
   ORGANIZATIONS DENOUNCE MURDER OF TRIQUI FARM WORKERS

     Some 200 to 400 farm workers rioted in the San Quintin valle
just south of Ensenada, Baja California on August 10, destroying
police cars and the administrative offices of a ranch and
damaging other property after a local farmer refused to pay wages
owed them. One man was injured and four arrested. A similar riot
occurred in San Quintin three years ago, leading to a flurry of
government investigations and social welfare programs.

     After Miguel Garcia Agundez, owner of the Rancho San Miguel
failed topay them, workers stoned his car and destroyed the
administrative office of the ranch.

     Victor Clark Alfaro of the Binational Center for Human
Rights (CBDH) accused the state authorities of being insensitive
to the owner's and workers' problems. He said that the State
Secretary of Labor of Baja California had leveled a 2,800,000
peso fine on ranch owner Garcia Agundez at the same time as a
fall in the price of tomatoes, making it impossible for the owner
to pay wages to the workers.

     The May First Workers' Front (FO-IM) [not to be confused
with the May First Inter-Union Group, CIPM] had been active in
the area, and some media attempted to associate the group with
the riot. The FO-IM has been linked to the Peoples Revoutionary
Army (EPR). Local authorities of the National Indigenous
Institute (INI) denied that the FO-IM had anything to do with the
events in San Quintin.

               Triqui Farm Workers Murdered

     Also in the San Quintin valley just a week before, in an
apparently unrelated event, various farm workers' organizations
had protested the murders of several farm workers: Francisco
Martinez Lopez, killed in 1993; Mateo Henandez, killed in 1997;
Bonfilio Herrera, Antonio Hernandez and Antonio Ramirez Montoya,
all killed in 1999. The workers' spokesperson, in a letter to
governor Alejandro Gonzalez Alcocer, also revealed an attempt to
murder Lazaro Perez Lopez on August 8. All the victims were
Triqui Indians.

                              ###

               MEXICO CITY GOVERNMENT AGENCY
                 CALLS HOUSEWIVES' STRIKE

     The Program for Equal Participation of Women, an agency of
the Mexico City government headed by Mayor Cuauhtemoc Cardenas of
the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), called a 24-hour
strike by housewives on July 22.

     Director Gabriela Delgado Ballestro said, "We believe
democracy starts at home by valuing domestic work and involving
all members of the family--not just the women." The strike was
called to coincide with July 22, International Housework Day,
since so designated by the international women's conference in
Beijin in 1995.

     Some reports said that some men had to cook and wash, some
for the first time in their lives. But the extent of
participation in the strike would be difficult to determine.

                              ###
SOCIAL STATISTICS

     Several of the following are projections for the year based
on the first six months.

Employment

     Mexico will create less than 600,000 jobs this year, far
less than the government?s target of one million, according to
Secretary of Labor Mariano Palacios Alcocer. In the first half of
the year only 326,000 new jobs were created, of which only
193,547 were permanent jobs. (Edgar Amigon and Karla Casillas,
 Imposible, generar un millon de empleos,  EL FINANCIERO, 17 Aug.
1999.)

Inflation

     Basilio Gonzalez Nunez, president of the National Commission
of Minimum Wages, projects that inflation this year will be about
13 percent, which is less than the 14 percent increase in minimum
wages. ( Ligera recuperacion de los salarios, preve la CNSM,  EL
FINANCIERO, 15 August 1999.)

     But Mario Suarez Garcia, a leader of the Revolutionary
Conferation of Workers (CRT) claims that the prices of most basic
foods continue to rise. Carlos Rivas Ramirez, a leader of the
General Confederation of Workers (CGT), also said that prices
were rising and called for government subsidies for basic
products. Both unions belong to the Congress of Labor (CT).
(Marco Antonio Garcia Granados,  Aunque el Precio del Huevo Bajo,
la Mayoria de los Alimentos Presentan Amenazante Tendencia
Alcista,  EXCELSIOR, 15 Augut 1999.)

Wages

     At the end of this year, wages of executive, salaried
employees, and unionized workers will have rise 18 percent, while
inflation will have risen only 15.7 percent, according to the
Grupo Hay consultants. The raises will be 18.2 percent for
executives; 18 percent for employees; and 17.7 percent for
unionized workers. (Jesus Castillo,  Subiran salarios 18 por
ciento en 99,  REFORMA, 13 August 1999.)

Minimum Wage

     The minimum wage has deteriorated at least 70 percent in the
last 15 years according to the Confederation of Mexican Workers
(CTM), making it the lowest minimum wage in two decades. (Raul
Adorno Jimenez,  El salario abatido en 70% en 15 anos: CTM,
UNOMASUNO, 11 August 1999.)

END MEXICAN LABOR NEWS AND ANALYSIS SEPT. 2, 1999, VOL 4, NO 13.


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