Mexico At The Brink
The Mexican government has shown its bloody fist. On April 20, it sent a large contingent of paramilitary police to break a steelworkers’ strike, killing two workers and wounding many. On May 3-4, police carried out an assault on the militant town of Atenco, killing one teenager, brutally beating and torturing many people, ransacking houses, raping women and arresting 200 with even more “disappeared.”
These brutal shows of force – and likely more to come – are taking place at the same time as a very bitter presidential election campaign. The right-wing PAN (National Action Party) government is managing the election in the corrupt manner of the old one-party regime of the PRI. The right-wing PRI (Party of the Institutionalized Revolution) and the “centre-left” PRD (Party of the Democratic Revolution) have been decrying what they see as a fraud being planned for the presidential and congressional elections on July 2.
The PAN is the most right-wing of the three parties, both socially and economically. The authoritarian PRI ruled for over 70 years. Both the PRI and the PAN are stressing law and order and would continue the neoliberal destruction of Mexican society and economy. Neither have any commitment to democracy and human rights. After the assault on Atenco, the PRI’s presidential candidate accused the PAN government of being too soft on rebels and the Zapatistas.
PRD: HOPE FOR THE LEFT?
The PRD arose from a democratic electoral insurgency in 1988 with great popular support and energy. It has articulated a defence of democratic rights, nationalized industries and concern about growing inequality and poverty. Most of the Left and many social movements joined the PRD in the hope of building a left-wing alternative to the PAN and the PRI.
While many progressive sectors of the population had great hopes for the PRD, both the Left and insurgent social movements were marginalized or coopted by the former PRI leaders who dominated the PRD from the beginning. The PRD never became the democratic and left party that was hoped for by much of the Left. The authoritarian and opportunist political culture of the old PRI as well as of some of the Left has made the PRD an arena of competing factions, leaving no room for democratic and popular participation. The PRD leadership views independent social and workers movements with suspicion. And the popular classes are viewed as voters and no more. The PRD has been careful to distance itself from insurgent movements, such as the Zapatistas and the people of Atenco. While the PRD presidential candidate, Andrés López Obrador, uses the slogan “For the benefit of all Mexicans….the Poor First,” he is at great pains to reassure capital and the US and to distance himself from the Latin American Left.
The victory of either the PAN or the PRI will keep Mexico on its tragic path of neoliberal destruction, massive emigration and brutal repression. The victory of the PRD would open up more ambiguous possibilities. Certainly, the neoliberal direction of the economy would continue, although with certain limitations. But popular forces inside, around and outside the PRD would push for a deepening of democracy, workers’ and trade union rights, defence of public ownership of natural resources (oil and power), and solidarity with the Latin American Left. López Obrador would seek to contain these demands and coopt leaders in order to reassure capital and renew Mexican economic growth.
ELECTION AND REPRESSION
In spite of his moderation, López Obrador is viewed by the Mexican Right, most of Mexican capital, and powerful forces in the US as a threat to US hegemony and neoliberalism. They are determined to prevent him from winning. Many observers feel that the election is already being cooked by the PAN.
This is where the very sharp escalation of state repression fits in. The repression (which goes beyond Atenco and the steelworkers’ strike) has been concentrated in areas of either PRD support or strong opposition to neoliberal policies and the government. These are areas that would be most explosive if people felt, as many already, do, that the election was stolen. These would also likely be areas of major resistance to the deepening of neoliberal attacks that would follow a PAN or PRI victory. The wave of repression is aimed at terrorizing and weakening areas of potential resistance while, at the same time, creating a climate of fear that will turn voters away from the PRD.
MOBILIZATIONS
There are two very important mobilizations taking place alongside the electoral campaign. The first is the campaign for union autonomy that developed after the government’s heavy-handed removal of the leadership of the miners’ and steelworkers’ union.
This campaign has gained momentum and the support of democratic unions, semi-authoritarian unions, and even some of the old corrupt, state-linked and class-collaborationist unions. The coalition for union autonomy is a grab-bag of different elements, some defending autonomy for the purposes of maintaining union leaders’ power and privileges, others for the sake of defending democratic unionism for workers. This coalition held by far the largest May Day demonstration this year and is showing a strong capacity of mobilization. It staged a one-hour general strike and threatens an open-ended general strike if its demands for the restoration of the elected leadership of the miners’ and steelworkers union and the dismissal of the Secretary of Labour are not met. While this is sheer bluff on the part of many of the leaders, it is tough talk and members are being mobilized.
The other significant mobilization is the “Other Campaign” (OC) of the Zapatistas.
The Zapatista leadership has engaged in a national tour of rallies and meetings in many parts of the country with the goal of developing a program and plan of struggle through listening and discussing. Subcommandante Marcos of the Zapatistas and other speakers have denounced all three parties and presidential candidates, reserving their most severe denunciations for López Obrador and the PRD. The character of the meetings has varied widely depending on the locations and the local organizers. In some cases, it has involved indigenous communities expressing their concerns and describing their struggles. In others, it involved an array of Left groups presenting their positions, with no space for audience participation.
The OC has had very uneven levels of support in different parts of the country. Its social composition is very different than that of the movement for union autonomy, being composed more of indigenous people, students, small far left groups, and the very, very poor. Its May Day march and rally was very spirited but by far the smallest of the three that took place in Mexico City (the third being that of the “official” union federation, the CTM).
The attack on Atenco has created a new and volatile situation. The OC put the rest of its tour on hold and, along with its allies, has organized a national campaign against repression that is planned to gradually escalate.
TWO SOLITUDES OF STRUGGLE
The campaign for union autonomy and the campaign against repression are fighting the same enemy, the capitalist class and state. But at present they represent two solitudes. There are no real linkages and a good deal of antagonism. While a unified struggle is essential to fight the repression happening now as well as the intensified neoliberal assault that would follow an electoral victory by the PAN or PRI, it would also be essential to withstand the coopting strategies that would follow a López Obrador victory, strategies that would attempt to turn independent movements into allies of the state once again, this time in an effort to give neoliberalism a human face.
Such unity would require important changes in both the workers’ movement and the OC. Rank and file workers and the Left need to support the union autonomy movement while fighting to turn it into a movement for union democracy, autonomy and militancy. The limits of the contained mobilization by union oligarchs need to be challenged from within the union movement. At the same time, the Zapatistas and their allies have to take a more nuanced approach to working with forces with which they disagree. Had they participated in the May Day march and rally for union autonomy – instead of holding a separate march and rally – they could have electrified the rank and file in the crowd and raised an agenda that challenged the limited one of the leadership of the union autonomy movement.
The lack of legitimacy of all branches of government, the accumulated bitterness of years of neoliberal hardship, the likelihood of a very narrow and suspicious election outcome and the escalating repression make the post-election period likely to be very volatile as the Right and the capitalist class mobilize to destroy López Obrador or the people mobilize to fight back against a PAN electoral fraud.
Both the Zapatistas and the front against repression as well as the union movement for autonomy will face crucial choices about allies and strategy after the election. Political clarity and principled unity will be all the more important. Mexico has entered a very dangerous and fluid period. The Left, the democratic workers’ movement and the “Other Campaign” have to develop strategies that are non-sectarian, nuanced, principled and combative at the same time. If not the prospects for Mexico are indeed grim.
Richard Roman is a fellow of the Centre for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean. Edur Velasco Arregui is an economics professor at the Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana in Mexico and a leading trade union dissident. They are completing two books on the Mexican working class.
