MEXICO IN CRISIS A Left View
Baird, Peter
In the aftermath of the earthquakes that have devasted parts of Mexico City since September 19, two conclusions can be drawn briefly as we go to press. First, the hardest hit are and will...
...So the Left's debate was whether the benefits of having representation in the House of Deputies (the Senate is still off limits) outweighed the drawbacks of giving legitimacy to the regime...
...This would be really throwing money away...
...We haven't learned how to build this relationship yet, but we should all work at doing so...
...Good] relations between the Mexican and the North American peoples are a necessity...
...This is negative not just because of sentimental patriotism, but because if there were greater cultural, economic and political domination by the United States, the same thing would happen to us as happened to the indigenous peoples after Cortez' conquest...
...Of course, since Fidel Castro said it this year it counts more now...
...government nearly closed the borders because Mexico wasn't prosecuting the guilty parties...
...Q: How do these latest elections fit into the long stretch of history you have lived...
...A: I have been prohibited from entering the United States since World War II by the U.S...
...Just as the government was the promoter of labor and peasant organizing in the 1930s, today it is the "disorganizer," the destroyer of all organizations that challenge it...
...But should Mexico go to the United States alone and say, "Mister Reagan, we won't pay...
...We are realistic and know that this grand bourgeoisie in power has control of the entire electoral process and the media, and has manipulated the results...
...Let's not forget that the dinosaurs were larger than we are and they disappeared...
...And if they run me out of Congress, so much the better...
...Many Mexicans, Peter Baird is a former NACLA staff member and co-author of Beyond the Border: Mexico and the U.S...
...In weighing all these factors, we felt it was more important at this time to denounce the demagogic character of the PRI and support elections only when they are linked to the mass movement and advance its independent organization, such as the COCEI campaign in Juchitan, Oaxaca.* Q: Punto Critico has emphasized that the PRI is losing a degree of its social control and that the status quo can not continue...
...But looking closer, the real "winner" in these elections was abstensionism...
...At the same time that the past regime of President Jose Lopez Portillo opened a door to minority political parties, it *See "Mexico's Juchitan-A Popular Challenge to the PRI," Report on the Americas, November/ December 1982...
...We are very concerned about this middle class and those who are fooled into thinking that the PAN alternative is good for them...
...As long as there aren't sufficient social forces to support a revolutionary leap forward- through civil war or through mass struggle-our task is to build our forces, combining electoral work with work in the labor and popular sectors...
...On the surface the PRI appears to have won again...
...And the three independent Left parties, with 6.3%, won 24 seats under the reformed election laws granting representation to minority parties...
...So what are we proposing...
...Police broke up strikes...
...I think it is an unconscious and little understood motivation we have to struggle for the survival of the human species...
...Popular Socialist Party (PPS...
...drug agent was killed...
...Q: What are your plans as a new Deputy...
...The PAN and equally conservative Mexican Democratic Party received 19% of the votes cast, for a total of 50 seats...
...Hundreds of activists "disappeared...
...A: I think the developed world continues to ignore the fact that there won't be sufficient oil for the rest of the century...
...The pressures are now even greater upon the central government to satisfy the basic needs and political demands of its population, while at the same time continuing to satisfy foreign investors and bankers...
...Their Tenants Coordinating Council denounced "acts of pillage by government officials and members of the official party," and demanded that international aid be used primarily to rebuild their homes, instead of reconstructing government buildings and moving the homeless elsewhere, as has been announced...
...Dirty tricks aside, it is evident that there is a large conservative bloc of middle-class and some poor voters who support the PAN...
...The U.S...
...He is now a printer and free-lance writer in Sacramento, California...
...The PMT, which withdrew from PSUM shortly after formation, earned representation in the House of Delegates for the first time, entering with six mandates...
...For Mexico, Venezuela, Indonesia and Nigeria they might say, "No problem...
...I think the PMT is moving in the right direction because its language is totally different from the other Left parties...
...For us this means that if the Mexican Left wants to win popular support it must change its methods...
...Now we say that Mexico is caught in a trap, because the enormous investment has been made and we can't say "dynamite the oil wells...
...Today...
...Our oil should be used as our means to exchange goods and services with the rest of the Third World...
...A: These elections were carried out amid the deep and cyclical crisis we are suffering in Mexico...
...Let us siphon off your oil reserves and we'll cover your debts...
...No, there are many nations in the Third World like us and we owe $750 billion together...
...Once you begin to lose control-as happened in 1968-there is little room for political maneuvering, and violence becomes the only option...
...5,500 dead, 300,000 homeless, 200,000 to 300,000 jobs lost and thousands still living in the streets...
...The PAN is strongly identified with the Roman Catholic Church...
...In addition to the history of electoral fraud and generalized mistrust of elected politicians, there is the problem that the Chamber of Deputies is not a real source of power or even debate for opposition parties...
...During the massive Mexican student movement, he represented the Polytechnical University on the National Strike Committee which led the protests, and was imprisoned along with many others for two years until their exile to Chile...
...Q: What do you see in Mexico's future...
...The Left was unable to capitalize on the deepening economic crisis and public discontent...
...A: One of the most debated topics within and among Mexico's revolu- tionary organizations has been the illegitimacy of the government and the intent of its "political reforms...
...Q: How do you evaluate the electoral performance of the PMT and the other parties...
...The U.S...
...Someone may say, "My goal is a better distribution of wealth, more equality...
...First, the hardest hit are and will continue to be the urban poor...
...Republican Party...
...The modern Mex- ican Left has had only 17 years of experience, since most organizations except the Mexican Communist Party date from the 1968 student movement...
...The spending binge of the grand bourgeoisie has left us with a foreign debt of $96 billion, interest payments alone at $12 billion a year and austerity policies that have reduced our standard of living 40% in three years...
...government influenced the elections, but remember that during this time a U.S...
...Relations between the two countries were extremely low...
...Q: Can you explain why the PAN is so strong, especially in the north...
...Yes, that is true, but why...
...Campa was born amid the tumultuous Mexican Revolution, has been a communist militant (PCM) since 1927 when he participated in the international campaign to free Sacco and Vanzetti...
...government is very conscious of the terrible weakness of the Mexican government, despite its apparent strength...
...HEBERTO CASTILLO Heberto Castillo is one of thefounders and now the head of the Mexican Workers Party (PMT), a small but extremely vocal opposition to the PRI regime...
...the armed guerrilla movement in the early 1970s...
...Of course the U.S...
...role in stifling Mexican democracy-were likewise ignored...
...We have always maintained that for us the electoral struggle is merely one more front of the mass struggle...
...including the Left leaders interviewed in mid-August in Mexico City, believe these demands are on a collision course...
...A: Eight years ago we predicted that our debt would grow if we relied too much on oil exports for revenues, because this would produce inflation and subsequent devaluations, would immobilize the campesinos by denying them needed farm credits, and in turn cause food shortages...
...What is your electoral strategy...
...But these are only a few countries...
...and now the experiences of electoral politics amid the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression...
...o 6 e 6The U.S...
...They talk here about what can be learned from the elections, the rise of the Right, the debt and economic crisis, the problems and promise of the Left and the future of MexicoU.S...
...Despite its costly campaign and dirty tricks, the PRI did not attain its goal-a fact which is bound to cause even more consternation in Washington...
...So they vote PAN even though they may agree with us, and this is hard to change...
...These valuable cultures were smashed...
...It is a divide and conquer strategy and has been effective...
...Campesinos who led land occupations were assassinated...
...They called for less government intervention in the economy, a reversal of agrarian reforms, withdrawal from the Contadora peace process and for a U.S.-style two-party system--with itself as the "New Majority...
...Send us your financial wizards and tell us how we can pay you...
...Valentin Campa and Heberto Castillo are newly elected Deputies, while the third leader interviewed, Ra61l Alvarez Garin, represents the non-par4 REPORT ON THE AMERICAS seats in the Chamber of Deputies...
...We proclaim absolute independence from the socialist parties of the world, analyzing and criticizing their internal problems, such as lack of democracy...
...Q: Have you ever been in the United States...
...A check or money order can be sent to Emergency Fund for Mexican Reconstruction, 1131 North Clark, El Paso, TX 79905 to legitimize its policies of continued austerity for the poor, foreign debt repayment at whatever cost and open arms to foreign capital...
...Their game is to support the PAN when they want to pressure the government on a business measure like denationalizing the banks, but then they turn around and back the PRI when they get what they want...
...So that is why we recently proposed in Havana that the Third World also discuss the problem of energy with the developed world...
...relations...
...Fifteen to twenty years from now there will only be enough oil for the rich nations, and all the poor ones will be without energy sources...
...It appeared the conservative National Action Party (PAN) would break the 56-year monopoly of the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) by winning the governorships of two northern states and numerous Congressional seats...
...The fund is channeling donations directly to victims through the umbrella Tenants Coordinating Council of Mexico City...
...We consider this "the Ronald Reagan alternative," that would have Mexico become an appendage of the United States...
...We base our thinking on our own heroes like [Emiliano] Zapata and [Benito] Julrez...
...the upsurge of independent labor unions and peasant land occupations throughout the 1970s...
...During these elec- tions the charros threatened to kick workers out of their unions and make them lose their jobs if they voted against PRI candidates...
...Unified Socialist Party of Mexico (PSUM...
...The rest would have to give up a chunk of their land...
...SEP'rEMBER/OCTOBER 1985 5 SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1985 5the only one that can defeat the PRI...
...This is the only way we will be able to break free of the terms of unequal trade imposed on us by the developed world...
...Q: As the leading critic of the government's oil policies, how do you analyze the current situation of Mexico's oil exports and the foreign debt...
...With the majority of the adult population unconvinced that needed change can be achieved by the ballot, millions of workers, campesinos and the increasingly strapped middle class will continue to search for ways to survive and oppose a system that is failing them...
...charro** leaders...
...A: This is the first time we have participated in elections, but in general we found that the PMT has a base of support-especially in urban areas-and our victory will give us greater space to work throughout the country...
...One of the beloved patriarchs of the Left and labor movement, he is, as Bertolt Brecht wrote, "one who has struggled all of his life...
...In the United States, one of the many expressions of across-the-border solidarity is the Emergency Fund for Mexican Reconstruction...
...Over half the registered voters-17.5 million Mexicansd-ecided to stay home in protest, or simply ignored the electoral arena...
...But when I was a presidential candidate in 1976, a group of universities in the Southwest invited me to speak and I was able to go...
...Popular organizations, Left parties and many trade unions have banded together in Mexico to support these demands and act as a watchdog over the government's reconstruction efforts...
...But in doing so the ruling party is weakening the labor and campesino confederations it has relied upon to maintain itself in power for six decades...
...All legislative proposals come from the executive branch and are rubber-stamped by the PRI majority, while those of the Left parties have been tabled...
...De la Madrid's Administration needed a strong turnout REPORT ON THE AMERICAS 4"A system that is failing them" liamentary Left...
...Socialist Workers Party (PST...
...A: For a number of years the govern- ment has been on the defensive from the demands of independently organized workers and campesinos...
...interference in the elections...
...His words are a compelling combiCastillo: "acerbic government critic" nation of scientist and politician, futurist and teacher...
...To destroy as much as possible the image of respectability that this house of perversion may have...
...Then it joined with other Left forces to form the Unified Socialist Party of Mexico (PSUM...
...It is a strength based on rigidity, so it's a system that can fall apart quickly-like Iran, to which it has been compared...
...Years ago they stole elections, using vulgar repression...
...Oil is unquestionably tied to the debt, so for the last two years we have been calling for the suspension of the foreign debt...
...Q: The ruling party protested loudly against a secret meeting between U.S...
...But this is not the only reason the PSUM's votes were low.* Most important among the other factors is the control that the government has over most leaders of the organized labor movement...
...He spent 13 years in prison for leading labor strikes and was the Left's write-in candidate for president in 1976...
...press reports as ineffective and irrevocably divided...
...Editorials in the United States scolded President Miguel de la Madrid, with The Wall Street Journal calling the elections a "Mexican debacle...
...authorities, even though I have relatives there...
...But until there is an electoral reform that puts control of the elections in the hands of the contending parties, there will be no way to defeat the PRI...
...Many did not vote at all...
...A: The Communist Party, which had been illegal for decades, was the principal force behind the electoral reform of the government...
...Punto Critico Revolutionary Organization (ORPC) is the clearest voice within the non-parliamentary Left and has a different evaluation of elections and the mass movement...
...We also had many internal problems in the campaign, but despite all this we came in third, which gives us political significance and the will to win over more voters in the next election...
...RAUL ALVAREZ GARIN Ratil Alvarez Garin, like many activists in today's trade union, university and popular political movements, CamDa: a life-lona struaale is from the "generation of '68...
...Q: Can you explain why ORPC and others have not opted to participate in the government's electoral reform, run candidates etc...
...Mexico would be paralyzed and a lot of our population would have to go to the United States to find food and jobs-a peaceful invasion...
...We come together out of necessity, but the people are also demanding greater clarity and unity from the organized Left...
...A: Very optimistic...
...REPORT ON THE AMERICAS unleashed a wave of repression against the independent social movements...
...The word is now used in derision to describe corrupt union bosses...
...The estimated $5.5 billion in earthquake damages are but 41% of what Mexico must pay in interest each year on its foreign debt...
...press paid unprecedented attention to these off-year elections...
...it's part of a process of "denationalization...
...Mexican Workers Party (PMT...
...Second, as can be seen from the following interviews with three of Mexico's most respected Left opposition leaders, the earthquakes hit a country already ravaged by economic crisis, social disintegration and political uncertainty...
...media to denounce widespread PRI corruption...
...Now they use computers to help them juggle the fig- ures...
...In the final analysis, why do we leftists carry on our struggles throughout the world...
...When the voting was over, the PRI candidates were declared winners in all seven gubernatorial races, with the PRI and its loyal opposition** getting 75% of the votes, and thus 324 of 400 *Revolutionary Workers Party (PRT...
...Now he is begin- ning his second term in the Chamber of Deputies representing the Unified Socialist Party of Mexico (PSUM...
...Authentic Party of the Mexican Revolution (PARM...
...Can you explain...
...A: I'm going in as a Deputy knowing nothing can be accomplished within this Congress, but will use it as a more prominent podium from which to denounce over radio and TV what goes on there-to tell people outside that these are a bunch of clowns and check-cashers...
...dissident trade unionists were jailed...
...I found a great progressive move- ment there, both inside and outside the university that I knew nothing about...
...VALENTIN CAMPA Nearly 17 years after the massacre of some 300 students in the Plaza de Tlatelolco by government troops--October 2, 1968-1 spoke with 81-yearold Valentin Campa in his apartment a few hundred yards from the infamous site...
...This has our country in turmoil...
...A: The PRI turned the Gavin meeting into a big scandal to buttress its accusation that PAN had outside backing...
...Abstentionism Triumphed In early September, Mexico swore in its newly elected governors and Congressional Deputies, concluding some of the most turbulent and widely publicized elections in modern Mexican history...
...When I came back home I told people to not underestimate the pro- gressive forces within the United States, especially among the Hispanic population...
...Q: Punto Critico has also written that "the crisis of the Left permits us to redefine and reorganize ourselves...
...Undoubtedly the United States used PAN to pressure the PRI into action, and apparently it was effective because at least some of the drug traffickers and corrupt officials were picked up...
...So let's stick together and negotiate together, and whatever we come up with is bound to be better than what we've got now...
...As for the common people who vote for the PAN in great numbers in the north, they want to oppose the PRI and think PAN is God's party,* and **The term, charro, or cowboy, stems from an early labor leader who was a cowhand...
...Was there U.S...
...So Mexico should discuss this problem with these nations and see what would happen if we went to the developed nations together and said, "We're broke...
...Since that time we share a heritage of common experiences, regardless of the differences we have had: the student movement itself...
...The 57-yearold silver-haired gentleman I spoke with looked more like a successful industrial engineer and professor-which he was-than an ex-political prisoner, acerbic government critic and now opposition Deputy...
...Are you optimistic or pessimistic about this possibility...
...One week after the first quake, 5,000 persons from 15 neighborhood groups in the most damaged areas marched on the Presidential Palace of Los Pinos to protest the forced displacement of their communities...
...The PAN had dramatized its cause with violent confrontations in border cities, deftly using the U.S...
...We call them *PSUM representation dropped from 17 to 12 Deputies...
...The three independent Left parties in the elections,* meanwhile, were dismissed in U.S...
...The Left has been in the middle of these popular movements that have involved hundreds of thousands of our people...
...A: Because the big private capitalists in the north are all founders and supporters of the PAN...
...By participating in its socalled democratic elections we would be reinforcing its ideological control and its public image as a pluralistic democratic government...
...We are completely aware of the corruption of the electoral process, but we see the same thing in the trade union sector and don't stop our work there because of it...
...In the end the opposition parties claimed fraud, but organized no massive protests or demonstrations...
...Returning to Mexico in 1971 after a presidential amnesty, he helped found Punto Critico--a collectively produced news journal of the Left that has been participating in and writing about the mass movement since that time...
...Q: The PSUM has been criticized for being too caught up in elections...
...Ambassador to Mexico John Gavin and PAN officials, as well as meetings with the U.S...
...We need to make people understand that the Mexicans who have lived and worked in the United States for 150 years are still second-class citizens...
...The PAN was beaten back, at least for a time...
...The underlying issues the Left raised--economic dependency, acute impoverishment and the historical U.S...
...There are many people who agree with this...
...All have spent years in prison for acting on their convic- tions...
Vol. 19 • September 1985 • No. 5
