On Saturday October 10 federal agents took six thousand facilities Luz y Fuerza del Centro (LyFC) in Mexico City, Puebla, Hidalgo and Morelos, in the Republic of Mexico. With this action and the corresponding decree issued by the president of this country, Felipe Calderón, is liquidating the company that supplies power to the center of the country, leaving the street 41 000 25 000 active employees and retirees.
Calderon's argument for ordering the closure of LyFC is that the company is unprofitable, and has a deficit of more than 3,700 million dollars. Inefficiency blamed for the "ominous salaries of employees." But let us see in detail: the lowest salary in the company Luz y Fuerza del Centro is about $ 600 and the highest is $ 1,200, plus benefits. The media launch attacks against the Mexican Union of Electricians "accusing" that the collective bargaining agreement gives them undue benefits such as discounts on electricity rates or refunds for expenses for meals outside the workplace. Before the onslaught against the company, and fueled by the media, some Mexican public opinion is completely devoted to cheers to the action taken by Calderón, arguing that these electrical workers are not as poor as they should, and have privileges and luxuries that do not deserve. In other words, the crime of these workers is that they are not starving, as it is the duty historic working class.
LyFC The settlement involves not only the imminent privatization of the electricity industry, but adds a new figure on the unemployment rate already during the administration of Calderón has grown by 79%. But electricians are not the only target of massive layoffs perpetrated by the Mexican government. Does no more than a month on the same Finance Minister announced 10 thousand new layoffs by the disappearance of three secretaries of state (that of Tourism, Agrarian Reform and Civil Service). In times of global crises in economies with higher proportions of public employment are those that seem to be resisting better to the debacle, these measures aim to negative consequences not only for workers in the electrical industry, but also for the rest of the Mexican people.
In another area, the figures in Mexico are no less alarming: five in 1600 "executed" in so far this year. In ten months has exceeded the total number of murders attributable to the drug occurred during the administration of former President Vicente Fox This is despite the fact that the State has deployed its forces in the streets leading to a militarization of the country, which is taxpayers a financial gap of more than double the resources for LyFC. As this year, the drug war have you spent nearly 8 billion dollars. The absence of detailed data on victims and the perpetrators of this violence does not permit a proper evaluation of the policy. If the numbers do not lie, it seems that if there is a company that urgently settle for inefficient and costly, is the so-called War on Narco.
Despite the critical economic situation, employment and security that exists in Mexico, Calderon's approval rating last August was 62.4%, a level that has held since January 2007, except perhaps the escalation of March this year, where Following the panic engendered by the epidemic of swine flu rose to 68%. If these statistics are reliable, which reflect the effectiveness of social control through the manipulation of the media, the use of force and surprise measures such as blow to independent trade unionism and epidemiological panic. Moreover, outside of Mexico, Calderon has some good reputation. Like with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, are virtually nonexistent articles critical of this policy in the English press. For example, the decree closing LyFC was applauded in the media, which was presented as a remedial measure to the allegedly poor service they provide LyFC workers and a key anti-corruption measure. As pointed Vicenç Navarro in his article "The double standard of the media" (Public Domain, July 16, 2009), the absence of critical voices against Calderón enters serious opposition to the articles critical of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, among others, and "sympathy for those presidents on the sidelines, leading to question the ideological diversity of the English media.
Usually at this most troubling is that Calderón is confirmed as a case of democratic president, despite reaching 'confused' power-manages to win and maintain the social popularity from clear dyes undemocratic measures. Another president who, facing the threat of the 'crime', the 'narco' (or a 'guerrilla') acts that the limits of democratic presidential warlordism become dangerously blurred. Other president before which, however, gives the domestic and international public opinion by their shapes and achievements, and at those critical voices are drowned with blows of a truncheon pen.
Violeta Vázquez-Rojas and Laia Balcells
