TheNewsMexico.com
February 28, 2002
By Conrad Fox

Social activists and human rights groups joined forces on Wednesday to denounce the planned creation of an "employment bureau" in the northern border city of Ciudad Juarez. The bureau, they say, will blacklist maquiladora workers involved in union activities and is a violation of human rights.

"(The bureau) is a repressive strategy suited to totalitarian regimes," said Pedro Reyes of Espacio DESC, an umbrella group of prominent human rights organizations in Mexico. "It rolls back all the gains made by Mexican workers over the last century."

Plans to create a "state employment bureau" were announced last week by the Ciudad Juarez chapter of the national business owners' union CANACINTRA. According to Mexican press reports, the bureau will compile a list of workers who participate in strikes, sue employers for labor law infractions or who are otherwise deemed as "conflictive" by their employers.

Reportedly, it will also include a registry of workers' fingerprints.

Representatives of Espacio DESC said the bureau constitutes a violation of the Constitution by impeding workers' rights to organize, as well as contravening federal labor law that specifically prohibits such lists. They called on the Secretary of Labor to sanction CANACINTRA.

Last week, president of CANACINTRA, Raul Picard, justified the bureau by saying it was directed at a "mafia" of workers and "pseudo-lawyers" who sought to blackmail employers with threats of labor unrest.

He warned that such threats may soon drive the already flagging maquiladora industry from Mexico. He added that the bureau was a "magnificent idea" and if it was successful, he would seek to implement it across the country.

Reyes said, however, that the bureau would heighten the already serious problem of companies abusing employees involved in union activities. The organization issued a list of companies, including Ford, IBM, Philips and Pemex, they say have harassed such employees.

"The bureau will put the lives of politically active workers at risk from those who want to stop the labor movement," said Reyes.

He may not be exaggerating the risk. On Sunday, a dissident member of the oil workers union, Jose Luis Rivero, was shot in the stomach by an unknown gunman days after he had participated in a protest against union leader Romero Deschamps.

Deschamps is a member of the Institutional Revolution Party (PRI) that ruled Mexico for 71 years. Many say he ran the union for years as a personal fiefdom, selling labor peace for payoffs and patronage. He is currently under investigation for his role into an alleged multi-million dollar election finance fraud.