Few labor struggles at home or abroad are being won quickly or easily today. Members of the Mexican Electrical Workers union (SME) proved that point by declaring victory after a difficult two-year fight that pitted their militant union against Mexico’s anti-labor government.
Army evicts workers
The battle began two years ago when Mexican President Felipe Calderón ordered police and the army to remove union workers from the public- owned utility known as Light and Power that serves Mexico City and surrounding states. After evicting the workers, the government liquidated the utility and
fired 45,000 employees, offering severance pay that was refused by 16,500 who
chose to keep fighting.
A comprehensive campaign
The remaining workers and their families developed an impressive campaign that organized actions in the streets, filed lawsuits in the courts, introduced bills in the legislature, and sent delegations to the United States and Canada in search of international support.
The ILWU was the first union in the United States to respond with a pledge of solidarity. ILWU International President Bob McEllrath sent a strongly-worded letter to Mexican President Felipe Calderón, demanding justice for the Electrical Workers Other support came from the United Steelworkers, United Electrical Workers, AFL-CIO, and many other unions and federations
around the globe.
Mobilizations & hunger strikes
Two years of sacrifice and coalition- building paid-off with an impressive show of public support that put 50,000 supporters into Mexico City’s national plaza – or “Zócalo” – during the days leading up to the country’s Independence Day, September 16. Workers previously organized actions
at the Zócalo which included mass marches and a hunger strike that attracted national attention.
Decades of anti-union politics
A showdown with the small but militant union has been brewing for decades. Tensions escalated in 1988 when pro-union Presidential candidate Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas lost a close election that many believe was stolen. Mexico’s presidents who took power after his defeat embraced an anti-union
“neo-liberal” agenda that included signing the NAFTA free trade agreement and selling-off Mexico’s public-owned mines, communications, energy, and transportation resources to wealthy investors. This sell-off of public assets allowed the world’s richest man – Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim – and other Mexican oligarchs to buy their country’s most valuable assets at bargain-basement prices. The nation’s resources that had been protected for the public by Lázaro Cárdenas, Mexico’s pro-union president (and father of candidate Cuautémoc) stood with workers who mobilized by the millions during the Great Depression in the 1930’s.
What workers won
After the showdown with 50,000 workers in Mexico City’s zocalo, the government agreed to:
- Guarantee jobs for the 16,500 union members in Mexico’s
national utility, the CFE; - Recognize the union’s elected leadership; and allow the
union to… - Release union funds that had been frozen by the
government.
The electrical workers union was allied with Mexico’s Miners and metal workers union.
SME claims victory
Martín Esparza, general secretary of the union, asserted that the agreement the union had reached with the Secretary of the Interior, “makes it possible for us to say to the society as a whole that the union will not stand in the way of the national celebrations which we can now all celebrate together.”
Through the intervention of Marcelo Ebrard, mayor of Mexico City, and Armando Ríos Piter, president of the Political Coordinating Committee of the Mexican Congress, the Secretaries of Energy, Finances and Labor agreed to establish negotiations with the SME for the reinsertion into the labor force of the 16,500 workers who have been unemployed since October 2009. Juan Marcos
Gutiérrez, undersecretary of the Secretary of the Interior, said that that office would “analyze and resolve” the problems facing those workers.
The parties also reached an agreement to reexamine and resolve legal charges against 12 SME members, whom the union calls “political prisoners,” who remained jailed on charges of robbery or sabotage in various prisons.
The undersecretary said that the parties would also be reexamining retirement benefits, union dues, social security and other related issues.
The union claimed that as a result of its occupation of the national plaza it had also won recognition of its union officers from the government through the process known as “toma de nota” (taking note). Undersecretary Gutiérrez, however, denied that this was the case, pointing out that the
decision had been issued on September 9 before the SME’s sit-in was in full swing. That decision, said the undersecretary, had nothing to do with pressure from the SME. It was rather an example of the government commitment to prompt and expeditious justice, said the undersecretary.
While the union claimed that its occupation of the plaza had also led the government to release funds which it had frozen, the government asserted that those funds had always been available but that because the union officers had not been recognized, they could not access the funds amounting to 21 million pesos. Now that the officers are recognized, they can access the accounts.
It should be noted that the government waited well over two months to recognize the union leadership, although in theory this is a simple administrative process. Moreover, the recent criminal charges brought against the SME leadership were purportedly based on an attempt by a legally recognized leader of the union to withdraw funds two years ago.