[PEN-L:11011] [NYT,MH,AP] Leaders Honor a Union Giant, (fwd)

[D Shniad <shniad@xxxxxx>]

> >* New York Times News Service, June 23, 1997
> >
> >  Mexican Leaders Honor a Union Giant, And an Era
> >
> >   By JULIA PRESTON
> >
> >   MEXICO CITY, June 23 -- Government officials and labor leaders turned
> >   out Sunday to pay their last respects to Fidel Velazquez Sanchez, the
> >   97-year-old labor patriarch whose death on Saturday marked the end of
> >   six decades of unbending top-down control of the Mexican union movement.
> >
> >   But notably absent from the ceremonies was any outpouring of grief
> >   from rank-and-file workers. Local unions from around the country sent
> >   huge wreaths of white marigolds and scarlet roses. But the streets
> >   outside the Mexican Workers' Confederation, the scene of many labor
> >   demonstrations over the years, were empty except for the parked luxury
> >   cars of government and labor officials.
> >
> >   President Ernesto Zedillo rendered his homage standing beside
> >   Velazquez's mahogany coffin during a wake in the atrium of the
> >   headquarters of the labor confederation. Velazquez ran the
> >   confederation for most of the last 60 years.
> >
> >   "He always encouraged negotiation, not confrontation,'' Zedillo said.
> >   "He always worked for stability, not uncertainty.''
> >
> >   Inside, after Zedillo's speech a few workers started to shout "Fidel!
> >   Fidel!'' But their voices sounded thin as they echoed up toward the
> >   skylight, and the slogans quickly subsided.
> >
> >   Government officials were ready to show their gratitude to Don Fidel,
> >   as he was known in Mexico, after he used his grip on the mainstream
> >   labor movement to help them impose a harsh belt-tightening program on
> >   Mexican workers that has begun to pull the country out of a steep
> >   recession that began in 1994.
> >
> >   But dissident labor leaders and opposition politicians immediately
> >   criticized the legacy of low wages that Velazquez has left and
> >   predicted that his death would unleash a power struggle to produce a
> >   more decentralized and aggressive labor movement, and to break the
> >   decades-old bonds between the unions and the government.
> >
> >   "The old labor system is passing away,'' said Kevin Middlebrook, an
> >   expert on Mexican labor at the Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies in San
> >   Diego. "It is quite likely that no one can maintain the unity and
> >   discipline Fidel Velazquez achieved. That was his historic
> >   contribution.''
> >
> >   Leaders of the labor confederation were shaken by the death of their
> >   leader, even though it was long expected, and moved to postpone the
> >   succession battle within their ranks.
> >
> >   Based on a pecking order established in the confederation's statutes,
> >   78-year-old Leonardo Rodriguez Alcaine, the head of the electrician's
> >   union, will act as secretary general until a national assembly meets
> >   in February. Rodriguez got the interim job because he is the only one
> >   of the highest leaders of the confederation who is in good health.
> >
> >   But already there are murmurings among midlevel officials that the
> >   mainstream labor movement needs a younger leader who will be less
> >   identified with years of unquestioned support for government policies.
> >
> >   As a sign of the confederation's lack of credibility with the public,
> >   the announcement of Velazquez's death Saturday morning prompted a
> >   storm of rumors that he had in fact died a day earlier but that the
> >   government delayed the announcement to allow for secret succession
> >   negotiations.
> >
> >   Velazquez's personal physician, Dr. Salomon Jasqui, later made another
> >   announcement confirming the date and time of death.
> >
> >   After Velazquez was first elected to head the labor group in 1941, he
> >   pioneered a system in which workers collaborated with the government
> >   in exchange for privileged treatment from public institutions like the
> >   national petroleum company and the social security system.
> >
> >   But this pact was practically destroyed by the grinding economic
> >   crisis of the last two years. The buying power of the average Mexican
> >   worker today is less than it was in 1980.
> >
> >   In the last two months Zedillo has been booed and taunted twice at
> >   labor gatherings, shows of disrespect that would have been unthinkable
> >   before the crisis.
> >
> >   "What Fidel Velazquez left workers was constantly declining living
> >   standards,'' said Agustin Rodriguez Fuentes, the head of a dissident
> >   labor coalition. "His death means that we can begin to rehabilitate
> >   the labor movement.''
> >
> >   Velazquez's death is expected to cost Zedillo's political party, which
> >   has ruled Mexico for nearly 70 years, votes among workers in national
> >   legislative and local elections on July 6.
> >
> >   Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, the leftist candidate for mayor of Mexico City,
> >   who polls indicate will be elected, said he lamented Velazquez's death
> >   as he would "that of any person,'' but he called him "the leader of a
> >   labor movement based on corruption and patronage.''
> >
> >   Rodriguez, the interim head of the confederation, reacted by banning
> >   Cardenas from the wake. Analysts said that Cardenas, who has been
> >   fiercely critical of Zedillo's economic policies, could attract many
> >   unions to his side if he gains control of the huge capital city.
> >
> >   Workers will almost certainly become more combative in their demands
> >   for wage increases now. But government officials were quick to stress
> >   that a more vociferous labor movement is not likely to destabilize the
> >   country.
> >
> >   "Mexico is a country of institutions,'' said Manuel Bartlett, the
> >   influential governor of the state of Puebla. "The passing of a great
> >   man does not mean the passing of stability.''
> >
> >   A second wake for Velazquez was held Sunday in the Mexican Senate,
> >   where he served two terms. His body was cremated and was to be buried
> >   Sunday night in a private ceremony at a cemetery in a prosperous
> >   neighborhood of Mexico City.
> >
> >
> >   (c) 1997 New York Times News Service
> >
> >
> >
> >* Death of Mexico's longtime union boss raises uncertainty
> >
> >   By ANDRES OPPENHEIMER
> >   Herald Staff Writer
> >   Published Sunday, June 22, 1997, in the Miami Herald
> >
> >   The man who ran Mexico's largest labor federation and helped guarantee
> >   the country's social peace for the past six decades died Saturday at
> >   97, raising questions over whether Mexico's ruling party will be able
> >   to continue controlling labor unions without him.
> >
> >   Fidel Velazquez Sanchez, head of the five million-member Confederation
> >   of Mexican Workers (CTM), died in Mexico City of cardiac and
> >   respiratory failure after 57 years at the helm of the
> >   government-supported organization, officials announced.
> >
> >   President Ernesto Zedillo praised Velazquez as a ``great leader'' who
> >   succeeded in ``reconciling the particular interests of labor with the
> >   general interest of the nation.'' Hundreds of officials of the ruling
> >   Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) showed up at CTM headquarters
> >   Saturday afternoon to pay homage to the deceased labor patriarch.
> >
> >   Opposition leaders remained largely silent, privately expressing hopes
> >   that the CTM will abandon decades of behind-the-scenes deals with the
> >   government that often enriched labor leaders but left Mexican workers
> >   increasingly poor.
> >
> >
> >    Wage increases limited
> >
> >
> >   Since Mexico embarked on its economic opening in the mid-1980s,
> >   Velazquez -- already showing up at official ceremonies in a wheelchair
> >   -- signed periodic wage and price agreements on behalf of Mexico's
> >   labor movement, which among other things set limits on pay increases.
> >
> >   These agreements allowed then-President Carlos Salinas de Gortari to
> >   undertake major economic reforms, including the privatization of
> >   hundreds of state companies and the signing of the North American Free
> >   Trade Agreement (NAFTA), with virtually no labor unrest.
> >
> >   The new policies have depressed Mexico's wages by some measures,
> >   although most economists say they were necessary to correct Mexico's
> >   chronic economic problems.
> >
> >   Velazquez, born in a small town about 20 miles northwest of Mexico
> >   City, never finished elementary school. He started his career as a
> >   milkman and founded the Union of Milk Industry Workers in 1923.
> >
> >   Rising through the ranks of the labor movement, he helped found the
> >   CTM in 1936 with strong support from nationalist President Lazaro
> >   Cardenas. Velazquez became the leader of the new group in 1940, and
> >   had himself re-elected 10 times.
> >
> >
> >    Upcoming elections
> >
> >
> >   Ruling party officials conceded privately that Velazquez's death came
> >   at an awkward time, only two weeks before the July 6 congressional
> >   elections. The PRI, which has ruled Mexico since 1929, relied on
> >   Velazquez and his labor federation to help get massive financial
> >   resources and votes for ruling party candidates.
> >
> >   In Saturday's edition of the daily Reforma, columnist Rene Delgado
> >   called Velazquez ``the last traditional pillar [the PRI] had left . .
> >   . a labor leader who gave his blessing to presidents and supported the
> >   system to the point of sacrificing the workers' organization.''
> >
> >   Velazquez, reverently addressed as ``Don Fidel'' by government
> >   officials, was portrayed as a dinosaur by newspaper cartoonists. He is
> >   expected to be temporarily succeeded by Leonardo Rodriguez Alcaine,
> >   79, a leader of Mexico's Electrical Workers Union. The CTM is
> >   scheduled to have internal elections next year.
> >
> >
> >   Copyright (c) 1997 The Miami Herald
> >
> >
> >
> >* No regrets as Mexico's 97-year-old labor leader is laid to rest
> >
> >   By MARK STEVENSON
> >   Associated Press Writer
> >   Jun 22, 1997  18:12 EDT
> >
> >   MEXICO CITY (AP) - Mexico has a name for the fierce, folksy,
> >   autocratic politicians like Fidel Velazquez who rose from the ranks
> >   of Mexico's rural poor to immense wealth and power after the Mexican
> >   Revolution.
> >
> >   That name is ``cacique,'' and Indian word meaning simply ``chief,''
> >   and in an age when Mexican politicians are beginning to respect the
> >   niceties of law, political debate and election results, Velazquez'
> >   death Saturday at the age of 97 marked the passing of an era.
> >
> >   Velazquez, whose remains were cremated Sunday after a desultory
> >   crowd of workers were bused in to pay their last respects, kept
> >   himself as head of Mexico's most powerful union confederation since
> >   the 1940s.
> >
> >   The cigar-chomping, gruff-speaking labor leader also helped keep the
> >   Institutional Revolutionary Party in power for 68 years.
> >
> >   ``Fidel Velazquez is a symbol of the shadowy history of Mexico.
> >   Nothing is eternal ... and just as Don Fidel died, the party he
> >   defended is dying little by little,'' said Luis Gonzalo de la
> >   Fuente, a 22-year-old student.
> >
> >   Don Fidel - as he was known - did it like a true cacique: through
> >   voice votes in crowded union halls, through generosity with allies
> >   and ruthlessness with those who opposed him.
> >
> >   When asked in early 1994 how the government should handle leftist
> >   Zapatista rebels in the southern state of Chiapas, Velazquez
> >   grumbled, ``they should be exterminated!''
> >
> >   He used a similar tactic to solve a walk-out by dissident workers at
> >   a local Ford plant in January 1990, sending in union thugs who broke
> >   up the strike. One union member was killed.
> >
> >   Velazquez' death may help the ruling party in its drive to modernize
> >   itself and drop the ``cacique'' image that has long dogged it, some
> >   say. Others, that it could help opposition parties by weakening
> >   labor-government ties.
> >
> >   ``This could present new opportunities for opposition parties to
> >   raid (labor) constituencies,'' said M. Delal Baer, a Mexico expert
> >   at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International
> >   Studies.
> >
> >   Velazquez' death may also herald changes for Mexico's beleaguered
> >   workers, for whom minimum wages now run at about $3.30 per day.
> >
> >   Francisco Hernandez Juarez, who formed a rival federation of
> >   telephone workers, told the weekly news magazine Proceso that the
> >   leader's death could help bring more democracy to a repressive union
> >   structure.
> >
> >   ``For good or ill, the absence of Don Fidel is going to accelerate
> >   everything,'' he said.
> >
> >   ``Let's see if we workers now find someone who will defend us
> >   because Fidel always sided with the government. He never defended
> >   us, the poor,'' said one unionized taxi driver, Enrique Hernandez.
> >
> >   But Mexicans differed on whether his death marked the end of a
> >   70-year career in defense of workers rights, or a dance with
> >   infirmity, old age and political servility which became almost
> >   macabre.
> >
> >   As the boss of Mexico's pro-government union movement since the late
> >   1930s, Don Fidel, as he was known here, enforced labor peace,
> >   stifled dissidents and harangued workers to vote for the ruling
> >   party.
> >
> >   Velazquez' temporary successor in the top post at the union
> >   confederation is Leonardo Rodriguez Alcaine, 78, who is also
> >   strongly pro-government and has served two terms as a legislator for
> >   the ruling party.
> >
> >   Rodriguez Alcaine has pushed for productivity bonuses and efficiency
> >   schemes in past union posts, but politically, little is expected to
> >   change within the confederation.
> >
> >   ``For the good of the union movement, there should be an orderly
> >   process of handing over leadership,'' said business leader Eduardo
> >   Bours.
> >
> >   The real threat to Velazquez' organization comes from an upsurge in
> >   recent years of more independent unions like Hernandez Juarez'
> >   telephone workers' union.
> >
> >   Velazquez's death also comes as the ranks of the ruling party's old
> >   guard are thinning.
> >
> >   The April death of media baron Emilio Azcarraga - who contributed
> >   huge amounts of cash and media coverage to the ruling party -
> >   weakened what Mexico City political activist Homero Aridjis called
> >   ``one of the twin supports'' of the governing party.
> >
> >   The other was Velazquez.
> >
> >   The ruling party, which has held the presidency uninterrupted since
> >   1929, has lost several governorships and mayoral posts in recent
> >   election years. Now the party is lagging in polls for Mexico City's
> >   mayoral election July 6. Its majority in the Congress is also at
> >   risk in voting that day.
> >
> >
> >   (c) 1997, Associated Press. All rights reserved.
> >
> >
> >* Mexico's labor taps new leader, questions linger
> >
> >   08:31 p.m Jun 23, 1997 Eastern
> >
> >   By David Luhnow
> >
> >   MEXICO CITY, June 23 (Reuter) - Mexico's influential labour movement
> >   on Monday named an ageing former electricity union boss as its new
> >   head, hoping to stave off crisis after the death of its legendary
> >   leader Fidel Velazquez.
> >
> >   Leonardo Rodriguez Alcaine, 78, was formally chosen to head the
> >   six-million-member Mexican Workers Congress (CTM), the pro-government
> >   labour confederation Velazquez headed from the 1940s until his death
> >   on Saturday at age 97.
> >
> >   Rodriguez Alcaine vowed to stick to Velazquez's legacy of unabashed
> >   official support, telling reporters his predecessor's dying words were
> >   a plea for labour unity.
> >
> >   ``The CTM will support the system 100 percent, even if independent
> >   analysts think we should do otherwise,'' he said.
> >
> >   But commentators questioned whether Rodriguez -- who openly admitted
> >   Velazquez's shoes would be hard to fill -- could continue to deliver
> >   the loyalty of organised labour to the ruling Institutional
> >   Revolutionary Party (PRI).
> >
> >   ``There is a serious risk when an organisation is based on one man,
> >   that when he dies, it could die as well,'' wrote columnist Jose
> >   Antonio Crespo in Reforma newspaper on Monday.
> >
> >   ``It is highly likely the old labour pillar of the PRI will begin to
> >   splinter, with different fragments looking for independence or joining
> >   the opposition outright,'' he wrote.
> >
> >   During Velazquez's long rule, the CTM turned out legions of party
> >   faithful on election day and in return was given scores of pro-labour
> >   seats in the Mexican Congress. But in the past decade, the ageing
> >   Velazquez and the pro-PRI union seemed unable to keep up with the
> >   times.
> >
> >   As the PRI evolved from a big-state leftist stance to embrace free
> >   markets and austerity policies, so labour's influence -- and workers'
> >   real salaries -- declined.
> >
> >   The lack of popular support for Velazquez was painfully apparent at
> >   the weekend, when chauffeur-driven party and union bosses hugely
> >   outnumbered ordinary workers.
> >
> >   Labour leaders claimed that workers, loyal to the end to ``don
> >   Fidel,'' did not want to affect national productivity by setting their
> >   work aside to attend the wake.
> >
> >   One winner from Velazquez's death could be independent union leader
> >   Francisco Hernandez Juarez, head of the telephone workers' union who
> >   has been spearheading a move to create a rival union group sometime in
> >   the next few months.
> >
> >   Derided by ``don Fidel'' as a traitorous homosexual, Hernandez was
> >   quoted on Monday as saying now was the time for workers to press their
> >   demands for an improvement in real wages, which were badly hit by the
> >   1994-5 economic crisis.
> >
> >   With support for independent unions in Mexico growing, the CTM must
> >   become more democratic or die, according to analysts. But its leaders,
> >   an group often mockingly referred to as ``dinosaurs,'' may be unable
> >   to avoid extinction.
> >
> >   A cartoon in Mexico City daily La Jornada on Monday showed a row of
> >   CTM leaders, men in wheelchairs with cobwebs, wondering what to do
> >   with Velazquez's now empty wheelchair.
> >
> >   ``The CTM lost a base of support. Its leaders have been an example of
> >   unscrupulousness in terms of wealth and privilege,'' wrote columnist
> >   Julio Hernandez Lopez in La Jornada.
> >
> >   ``The millionaire former electricity union leader hasn't a fraction of
> >   Fidel's ability to keep the official labour movement afloat,''
> >   Hernandez wrote about Rodriguez Alcaine.
> >
> >
> >   Copyright 1997 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
> >
> >
> >* Successor named to late Mexican labor boss Velazquez, vows no change
> >
> >   06/23/97 08:40:09 PM
> >   By BILL CORMIER Associated Press Writer
> >
> >   MEXICO CITY (AP) -- Mexico's largest and most politically influential
> >   union on Monday named a new chief, who vowed to adhere to the
> >   staunchly pro-government policies of his popular but controversial
> >   predecessor.
> >
> >   Leonardo Rodriguez Alcaine had been acting secretary-general of the
> >   Mexican Workers' Confederation since Fidel Velazquez was hospitalized
> >   June 5. Velazquez, the iron-fisted boss who dominated Mexico's union
> >   movement since the late 1930s and helped keep the ruling party in
> >   power for decades, died on Saturday at age 97.
> >
> >   Rodriguez Alcaine's appointment, which was expected, was formally
> >   approved by the confederation's executive leadership at a morning
> >   meeting, the government news agency Notimex said.
> >
> >   The 78-year-old Rodriguez Alcaine, who has experience heading the
> >   electricians' wing of the labor coalition, will hold the post until a
> >   meeting of Mexico's union leadership in February, at which time his
> >   tenure could be extended or he could be replaced.
> >
> >   ``I follow the straight line, the nationalist line of Fidel
> >   Velazquez,'' Rodriguez Alcaine said in comments carried by Notimex. He
> >   added that he would retain Velazquez's aides in their union posts.
> >
> >   The real threat to the pro-government confederation, which boasts 6
> >   million members, comes from a recent surge in independent unions,
> >   which coincides with the declining strength of the ruling party's old
> >   guard and the death of members like Velazquez.
> >
> >   Nonetheless, Rodriguez Alcaine said he would seek to keep the
> >   confederation united while continuing talks with industry.
> >
> >   ``Today we need the physical and moral strength of all our workers to
> >   remain unified and move ahead,'' he was quoted as saying.
> >
> >   Velazquez had been much criticized for an alliance with government
> >   that guaranteed labor peace while keeping Mexican wages, currently a
> >   minimum of about $3.30 per day, among the lowest in Latin America.
> >
> >   But Rodriguez Alcaine pledged to continue seeking better wages and
> >   working conditions.
> >
> >   AP-CS-06-23-97 2138EDT
> >
> >
> >* Mexico's PRI Trying to Keep Alive Labor Support After Velazquez
> >
> >
> >   Mexico City, June 23 (Bloomberg) -- Hoping to keep alive the support
> >   of Mexican Workers Confederation members, the ruling Institutional
> >   Revolutionary Party said it will use images of the late labor leader
> >   Fidel Velazquez in its campaign ads ahead of the July 6 elections.
> >
> >   Velazquez, who died Saturday, led the confederation for more than 50
> >   years, trading support for the PRI from millions of members for
> >   regular wage increases and labor laws that boosted workers' benefits
> >   and job security.
> >
> >   ``Don Fidel and the PRI were indivisible,'' said Alfredo Philips, the
> >   party's head of international affairs. ``We plan to honor the memory
> >   of Don Fidel both inside and outside the campaign.''
> >
> >   Velazquez, who once said tequila, cigars and his refusal to see
> >   doctors were responsible for his longevity, died of heart and lung
> >   failure at age 97 after a year of hospitalizations for pneumonia,
> >   intestinal infections and other ailments.
> >
> >   His death has been called one of Mexico's most important political
> >   events this century, and has many observers speculating that the PRI
> >   -- which has controlled Mexico's government without interruption since
> >   1929 -- may be headed for a historic defeat on July 6.
> >
> >
> >   PRI Sees Benefit
> >
> >
> >   Mexico's 52 million voters will replace the 500-member Chamber of
> >   Deputies, elect 32 new senators and five state governors. Also, for
> >   the first time since the 1920s, citizens of Mexico City will elect a
> >   mayor. For decades, the president appointed a regent to govern the
> >   capital.
> >
> >   The PRI, at least publicly, remains optimistic about its chances for
> >   victory and suggests that Velazquez's passing may help it at the
> >   ballot box.
> >
> >   ``I think his death, like that of a beloved family member, will unite
> >   the party,'' Philips said. ``Not so much for the man, but to honor his
> >   legacy.''
> >
> >   To be sure, Velazquez and the confederation saw their power wane in
> >   the late 1980s, when Mexico opened its economy to imports and foreign
> >   investment. More companies demanded pro-business labor legislation and
> >   linked pay increases to productivity.
> >
> >   The worst blow came after the December 1994 peso devaluation. For the
> >   first time in memory, the Mexican government was unable to deliver
> >   higher salaries to maintain workers' buying power and retain their
> >   political loyalty. This occurred as President Ernesto Zedillo promised
> >   the Clinton administration and the World Bank he would do all he could
> >   to stifle inflation.
> >
> >
> >   Austerity Measures
> >
> >
> >   Instead of regular minimum wage increases, Mexico's workers were
> >   forced to swallow labor contracts that linked salaries and job
> >   security to productivity increases.
> >
> >   Worker anger over the confederation's subservience to Zedillo's
> >   austerity measures and to the PRI led to an unprecedented formation of
> >   rival labor groups beginning in 1995. Last year, without strong
> >   confederation support at the polls, the PRI suffered record low voter
> >   turnout and losses in local elections in the states of Mexico,
> >   Hidalgo, Guerrero, Morelos and Coahuila.
> >
> >   Earlier this year, in perhaps the most serious sign of worker
> >   discontent with the PRI, Zedillo and CTM officials were repeatedly
> >   heckled at the government's invitation-only May Day ceremony.
> >
> >
> >   --Tim Loughran in Mexico City (525) 514-3042, through the New York
> >   newsroom (212) 318-2300/lw/ltk
> >
> >   Copyright 1997 Bloomberg Business Wire. All rights reserved.
> >
> John W. Warnock
> Department of Sociology
> University of Regina
> Regina, SK     S4S 0A2
> Tel: (306) 352-5282
> Fax: (306) 585-4815
>
>