Mexico in Focus

Mexico is not in a civil war

Is Mexico in a civil war or is this a terribly extended “settling of accounts” between cartels? This is a question that a reader posted after my entry, “Alarms are ringing along the Texas border,” last Thursday.

There is not an easy answer to his question.

According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:  “War should be understood as an actual, intentional and widespread armed conflict between political communities… War is a phenomenon which occurs only between political communities, defined as those entities which either are states or intend to become states (in order to allow for civil war).”

The definition adds that certain political pressure groups, like terrorist organizations might also be considered “political communities” if they are associations of people with a political purpose and many of them aspire to statehood in certain lands.

In the American Civil War, for example, 11 Southern states declared their secession from the U.S. and fought against the Union. In the Spanish Civil War, the Nationalist forces fought against the Republican government to establish a right-wing dictatorship.  More recently, in Guatemala, a group of revolutionaries fought for more than 30 years against right-wing military regimes. 

In these three well-known cases, the political reasons that ignited the confrontation were clear. And in all of them, the entities involved had a clear political intent or agenda, an idea of the kind of nation they want to be. They were fighting for ideals.

Scholars have established criteria to define civil war. Among these criteria is the number of dead people, which can be from 100 to 1,000 per year.  They also remark the fact that one of the sides must have some kind of popular recognition as a belligerent group, and in some cases they must have the political control of certain areas.

Going back to the original question, we could say that besides the number of dead people and the fact that the drug traffickers have a de facto control of certain areas, none of the other criteria –a political project and the popular recognition– have been met in the case of what is going on in Mexico.  So, I do not think that we can say that there is a civil war in Mexico.

However, in the end, this is a rhetorical question.  There is in fact a war between the government and the drug cartels, which have left more than 17,042 people dead between 2003 and 2009. It is a war that is displacing people from their cities and towns and it is affecting every one--children, women and the elderly.

It is also a war between cartels to control the market.

I’m not a scholar nor an expert.  Most likely, political scientists would have a better response to the reader’s question.   Again, I wouldn’t say that Mexico is in a civil war, but that doesn’t mean that the conflict can’t escalate and become something larger.

What would I call it? It’s simply a  bloody battle, a terrible and unfortunate war that I’m sure the majority of Mexicans deplore.

Alarms are ringing along the Texas border

 

Ciudad Juárez is not the only city along the Texas border where the alarms are ringing. Classes were canceled in most of Nuevo Laredo and Reynosa's schools last Monday and Tuesday after rumors spread thoroughly that a criminal organization was planning to kidnap students from public and private schools.

Today, the U.S Consulate in Reynosa announced that it will be closed for the following days  due to the increasing violence in the city. According to press reports, consul Michael Barking is alerting U.S. citizens not to cross the border.

On Tuesday, there were also reports of 19 people killed in different confrontations between members of the cartels and the federal police in Tamaulipas.

In Ciudad Mier –near the Rio Grande river-, an armed squad attacked the municipal government building and took at least 10 municipal police officers as hostages. The attackers used at least 20 pick-ups marked with the acronym “CDG” for Cártel del Golfo. 

A report from the newspaper “El Mañana” states that violence in these border towns is turning Texan tourists away. The bars, restaurants and stores are feeling the pinch, exactly the same way that in Cd. Juárez.

On Feb 20, a big sign was shown in the streets of Reynosa saying “Reynosa is a safe city. Nothing happens. Nothing won’t happen. Continue your regular life. We are part of Tamaulipas and we don’t attack citizens. Signature: CDF. Cártel del Golfo”.

The war between the Cártel del Golfo and the Zetas in Tamaulipas is getting hotter, and as it has happened in Cd. Juarez, the citizens have been caught in the middle.  Tamaulipas Governor Eugenio Hernandez Flores is requiring more federal troops to face the emergency.

Yes, the alarms are ringing loud all along the border of Texas, just as they have been ringing in Cd. Juarez for a long time.  

About Fleeing Juárez

Moving from one country to another is not something that can be done easily. There are many considerations a family must evaluate before taking the decision.

During a protest last year in Ciudad Juárez, I met a doctor who was deliberating if he should move to another place. He owned a clinic and had a good reputation and a fair number of patients earned in 20 years in the practice of medicine.  However, he was a victim of extortion and he knew that he won’t be able to sustain his clinic if he agreed on paying the protection fees.

A move to El Paso would seem natural. But he knew that he wouldn’t be allowed to practice medicine in the U.S. Furthermore, he couldn’t picture himself doing anything else for a living. 

What choices do you have,? I asked him. Not many, he said. He could shut down his clinic and try to work in the public sector, where the salary won’t be enough to sustain his family. He could also give medical attention from his house, where he would be also exposed to extortion. He could move to another state inside Mexico and try a new beginning.

Whatever choices he would take, his lifelong achievements in medicine could possibly be at stake and he may need to re-start from zero. Any other professional, such as an accountant, a dentist, an architect, an engineer or a teacher, face a similar dilemma.

In the case of businesses the story is not different.

To get an investor visa is not an easy procedure. According to the State Department, some of the requirements to obtain an E visa include to have a “substantial” amount of money to be invested in the U.S. The applicant should demonstrate that he/she have already invested some of the money in the U.S. either having renting a space or hiring people.  Uncommitted funds in a bank account are not considered an investment.

Besides that, opening a business in the U.S. could be a very difficult process, as some of the owners of restaurants and bars that have moved to El Paso told me recently in interviews. The regulations to operate in the U.S., the tax system and the hiring process are absolutely different from the procedures in Mexico and they can challenge anybody's initiative.

Before writing this entry, I was listening a Spanish AM radio station from Cd. Juárez to which people call to report incidents of violence. A woman was describing that her elderly sister, who is retired and makes $76 a month, was victim of extortion.

She said that some people have the choice of leaving the city, but a big number don’t have that opportunity. Besides that, she said, this is our city, we were born here… why should we leave?

The big exodus documented yesterday by reporter Adriana Gomez Licón shows that the Juarenses are eager to move away from the violence, but unfortunately not all them are able to escape the new reality of their city.

 

A profession under attack

On Monday, the Journalism Center and Public Ethics (Centro de Periodismo y Ética Pública) released its 2009 report, which extensively documents the problems that journalists are facing in Mexico.  

The report is revealing because it shows how the freedom of the press has been under attack not just by criminal organizations, but also for some of the state institutions.

Here are some of CEPET’s findings:

–  A total of 13 journalists from print and radio were killed in different states in 2009. In seven of these cases, CEPET has evidence linking the assassination to the stories the reporters were working on.

_  As December 2009, journalists around the country reported a total of 140 incidents against the freedom of the press. The states with most of the cases were Oaxaca, Veracruz, Chihuahua, Distrito Federal and Tamaulipas.

– The State security forces –federal, state and municipal police, as well as the Army– have become the main aggressors of journalists. In fact, in one out of three reported attacks against journalists, a security force was involved. Among those incidents were physical aggression, threats and illegal detention as well as the seizure of equipment and recorded material.

– At the municipal level, political authorities tried to control the flow of information mainly through threats and coercion.

– Twelve out of the total number of incidents reported were linked to criminal organizations. Those were the most gruesome attacks and included the killing of two journalists in the northern state of Durango, the attacks against a TV station in Monterrey as well as attacks against newspapers’ offices in Nogales, Torreón, Culiacán, among others.

CEPET’s report shows again that when a country is facing a war, in this case an internal war, the freedom of the press becomes one of the first victims. As CEPET’s conclusion states, the bottom line is that every time a journalist is attacked, the society’s right to be informed is also attacked.

 

When age matters

My brother has lost his job.

No worries, somebody would say. He’ll get a new job soon. I hope so, but certainly, he will have a hard time before being hired again.

Not just because the economy situation –which has left around 1.7 million people unemployed until January this year–, but also because he is 45 years old.

In Mexico age matters when trying to find a job. After you turn 35, you are considered old and your experience and qualifications don’t matter a lot.

Here is another case: A good friend of mine has been an elementary teacher for almost 25 years and her job has been recognized several times. Two years ago she took a break from teaching, but when she tried to go back to work, she had the same problem my brother is having: “We are just hiring teachers no older than 30”, she was said in several schools.

Yes, that’s discrimination and it is a common practice in Mexico.

A survey of 2,800 persons done by OCC Mundial in Mexico, a major job recruiting association, found that 80 percent of respondents had faced some kind of job discrimination, mainly because their age (50 percent), gender (21 percent) or socio-economic condition (16 percent).

ANDLEG, a recently created organization to fight age and gender discrimination in the job market says that just 10 percent of the current job offers consider people older than 35 years. 

Although Mexican Constitution prohibits discrimination, Mexicans rarely complain or file a lawsuit against companies. I’m sure that many people think that doing so is a waste of time. 

Job discrimination practices take many talented and productive people out the job market. They also can discourage young people to invest in their education –think about a kid who sees that his father’s experience and credentials doesn’t count anymore–.   

In the best scenario, discrimination can give a 40 year-old person the necessary push to decide that is time to open his/her own business –of course if he/she has the money to do it. But in the worst-case scenario, one in which the job market is tight and very competitive, discrimination can just create disenchantment, despair and lack of hope.

To make things worst, Mexico needs to create around 500,000 new jobs every year to absorb the entrants to the labor market, most of them young people, who also deserve the opportunity of having a job. So, how a country can find the balance between this two extremes?

Traveling to Mexico

Sitting in front of my computer I’m facing a dilemma.

I don’t want to be writing just about the violence in Mexico.

In fact, one of my regular complaints against the U.S. newspapers coverage of Mexico is that they focused too much in the violence and don’t care about many other relevant and important news of the country.

Unfortunately I’ve been doing the same thing since I started this blog three weeks ago. News is news and you can’t avoid to be caught by them.

But today I’m not going to write about the violence. Instead, I’m going to write about Spring Break, which is almost around the corner.

Are you planning to go to Mexico?  Are you afraid of the violence –oh Gosh! Here comes the violence again!  Yes, I should admit it. There’s no way to escape the topic.

Okay, if you are afraid of it, here are some tips that could help you to plan your trip and to feel safer. But before going to that, let me say that around 24 million international tourists visited Mexico in the past year, and I would say that the majority of them went back to their countries without major problems.  So, you can travel to Mexico and still be safe.

If you want to have a good trip, follow some of these tips:

--  Visit the State Department website to find information about the city that you plan to visit.

--   Once in Mexico, don’t carry large amounts of cash, and don’t open your wallet to show how much money you are carrying.

--  Don’t carry all of your credit cards with you. Choose the one that is less risky to lose.

--  Don’t use ATM’s at night. Try to withdraw your money from an ATM inside a bank.

--  Don’t take cabs randomly. Although is more expensive, you should use “sitios de taxis”, which are safer. Try to get the phone number of one of this sitios from your hotel manager or just look at the Yellow pages. They will pick you up wherever you are.

--  Don’t show that you are afraid. If people see that you have fear, they could assume that you have a reason to be afraid. In other words, they can think that you have money and they can target you.

-- If you are a long-night party person try to get information about the neighborhood that you are going. As in any other city in the world, there are safer areas than others. A good travel guide (lonely planet are my favorites) can be helpful as well as the hotel managers.

Last, but not least, don’t let the fear to overshadow your vacations. Enjoy your time in Mexico. Eat well (you’ll find the most amazing gastronomy there), walk a lot, enjoy the beaches, try to practice you Spanish and have a great time.

 

Warning: Ciudad Juárez situation is not unique

Ciudad Juárez has been in the spotlight since Jan. 31.

The killing of 15 young students during a birthday party generated an unusual response by the local, state and federal authorities, who finally decided to pay attention to citizens’ concerns and to work together to build a more comprehensive strategy to repair the social fabric.

Let’s hope that all the uproar created by President Felipe Calderon visits to Cd. Juárez will result in significant changes that will improve Juarenses’ quality of life and also restore the trust and credibility of its institutions.

However, let’s not forget that the situation that has affected Cd. Juárez is not unique.

States such as Coahuila, Tampico, Sinaloa, Michoacán, Nuevo León and Tijuana have already seen their own share of violence. The same day that students were massacred in Cd. Juárez, eight people were killed and more than 15 were injured in shootings at three bars in Torreón, Coahuila, where the Zetas maintain control of the drug market.

Michoacán is the center of operations of La Familia, a powerful drug cartel that has been linked to hundreds of killings and beheadings since 2006. In other states, there have been brutal killings, kidnappings and extortions. The violence associated with drug trafficking is everywhere in Mexico.

One can argue that the violence in those states has not reached the level of what is happening on Cd. Juarez -and that is true. In Cd. Juárez, the current war between two cartels has had a bloodier outcome.

But what has happened in Cd. Juárez could happen in any other city where the drug traffickers have established their areas of control.  What the government is trying to do to restore the social fabric in Juárez and to create opportunities for the populace is something that must also be done for most of the country.

The government of Mexico has neglected Juárez for many years and its citizens have paid the consequences. Now the city is in the spotlight and hopefully something good will come from this.

But the government needs to think about what they are going to do at all the other places where drug traffickers are entrenched before more and more young people get caught into the their nets.

 

Mexico, a country in mourning

On Monday, a Mexican legislator released new figures on the number of people killed in Mexico.

Senator Felipe Gonzalez said that 17,042 people have been executed in Mexico between 2006 and 2009.  

Yes, that number is correct, 17,042.   

Of those, 5,000 were police officers, 620 were women and 87 were soldiers.

If we do an exercise of putting a human face to all of the people killed, what results is a society in mourning.

Let’s imagine, for example, that every person killed has been mourned by a conservative estimate of 10 individuals –mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, wives, husbands, sons, daughters and friends. If we do the math, we will have at least 170,420 people who know someone who has been killed in violent acts over the last three years.

Let me be clear: I’m not judging the guilt or innocence of these murdered individuals, I’m just thinking about the wounds that this violence is inflicting on the country.

Think about the little kid whose father was slain because he didn’t accept to pay the 'cuota' or the extortion fees required by criminals. How does this boy cope or understand the murder of his dad? How will Mexico’s children reconcile the idea of justice and moral values with the news that they see or hear daily on the news?  Think about the mother who was not able to give a Christian burial to her son or daughter because of her fears that her family will be attacked during the funeral. How could she find peace?

The numbers released yesterday need to be analyzed in light of all the human drama that is being lived on a daily basis.  And any strategy aimed to rebuild the social fabric needs to include measures that will ease the pain of this already deeply wounded society.

 

 

 

 

Living with fear

After reading Stephanie Sanchez and Aileen B. Flores’ story “Aura of anxiety shadows Juarenses”, I found out an interesting author. 

His name is Gabriel Kessler, an Argentinian expert who studies the sociology of insecurity in Latin American countries.

Kessler, author of “El sentimiento de Inseguridad: sociología del temor al delito” (The insecurity feeling: sociology of the fear of crime) has some interesting notes about what happen to a society when it lives in constant fear. 

Here are some of his findings:

– Everybody becomes suspect of each other, which means that distrust becomes the rule of social interaction.

– People get used to the idea that something bad could happen to them anytime.

– The idea of safe places vs. unsafe places vanishes. However, some places are considered more unsafe than others, and often, the poorest and more neglected areas are the ones more affected by that stigma. This creates a vicious circle because investment in those areas becomes scarce.

 – The economy in general is impacted because people doesn't go out.

– People start asking for tougher anti-crime strategies and harder punishment for criminals, including death penalty. In some scenarios, people can start taking justice in their own hands.

Kessler analysis is focused in the Argentinian society in a totally different context, but his general findings doesn't seem to be far away from what the people of Cd. Juarez is living now.

Angangueo needs help

Angangueo, in the state of Michoacán, is a very well-known town in the environmental and touristy world. It’s to its forest where millions of Monarch butterflies migrate every year to escape the winter from Canada and the United States.

But the pictures that we are seeing today from Angangueo are not those of amazing butterflies hanging from the trees, but the ones of desperate people trying to rescue something valuable from their homes.

The whole village has practically destroyed for the last week out-of-season rains, that left 35 people dead, more than three dozens of disappeared and thousand of homeless people.  Eighty percent of the Angangueo’s population –estimated in 9,000 people– is now in shelters.

Michoacán is one of the Mexican states with the highest rates of migration. People from Michoacán trend to migrate to cities as Chicago, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Dallas, Nueva York and Milwaukee, where important communities of Michoacanos have been settled. Between 2.5 and 3 million of Michoacanos live currently in the U.S.

Like many other migrants in the U.S., the Michoacanos have a long tradition of helping their original towns. They use to send money back to build schools, hospitals, recreational centers and everything it is needed.

Unfortunately, the economic turndown has had a negative impact in the amount of remittances that Mexicans send to their countries, which according to Mexico’s central bank have fallen in more than 12 percent in one year. In Michoacan, remittances represent 18 percent of the state gross income, which means that almost two out of every 10 dollars come from remittances.

Angangueo is not the only town in Michoacan affected by the storms. Other affected municipalities are Ocampo, Tuxpan, Tuzantla y Tiquicheo, Jungapeo, Zitácuaro and Ciudad Hidalgo.

Angangueo will be rebuilt from scratch, and most likely, it will need the solidarity of Michoacanos living abroad.  Some clubs of Michoacanos in California and Chicago have already started and they are calling all their paisanos in the U.S. to join their efforts.

With everybody's help, they hope, the towns will return to normality and the beautiful photos of butterflies will be once again in the front pages of newspapers.