More than half a million Mexicans are without power after the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) cut their service for not paying their bills.
Across the country, 543,128 customers didn’t pay their electric bills that were due May 12.
Most of those cut off were customers in México state, Mexico City, Jalisco, Michoacán, Puebla and Guerrero.
CFE director Manuel Bartlett had warned that there would be no deferrals or forgiveness of electricity debt incurred during the coronavirus pandemic, pointing out that the CFE still had to meet a payroll for some 90,000 workers as well as other expenses to keep the federal utility up and running.
Power consumers have noted a considerable uptick in their bimonthly bills due to stay-at-home measures enacted late last March, as people remaining in their homes tend to use electrical appliances more.
One CFE customer reported his regular 400-peso (US $18) electric bill jumped to 1,500 pesos (US $67) due to self-isolation measures.
This has caused protests in various parts of the country, where citizens are asking the federal government to suspend power cuts due to non-payment during the health and economic crisis.
In Lázaro Cárdenas, Michoacán, residents first petitioned the CFE to defer payments in early May and received no response, so they protested outside the electric utility’s office on Wednesday, as citizens did in 10 communities across the state
“At no time have we said that we do not want to pay,” said local activist Moisés Hernández Lozano. “We want them not to cut it off and in some way charge us later or find an alternative but not cut it.”
In Morelia, Michoacán, politicians are lobbying the CFE to allow households and agricultural businesses to defer payments for 12 months, free of interest and surcharges.
“There are sick people, there are people who do not have money to pay, and we are not asking that it not be paid, what we are asking is that the payment be deferred, that there be no reconnection costs or fines and that cuts be avoided,” said federal Deputy Armando Tejeda Cid.
The CFE’s policy is in line with that of the federal government with regard to the payment of taxes. President López Obrador has repeatedly insisted that there would be no deferrals or tax breaks during the coronavirus emergency.
Parents protest outside the Ministry of Health in Mexico City.
Nine parents of children with cancer began a hunger strike outside the offices of the federal Health Ministry in Mexico City on Wednesday to protest the shortages of cancer medications that have threatened their children’s chances for survival for at least two years.
Reports of understaffed and understocked hospitals began to pop up last spring when the effects of federal budget cuts began to set in. Despite several promises from the federal government to solve the problem, parents are still having trouble getting the life-saving cancer drugs their children need.
The parents said they will continue their strike until Health Minister Jorge Alcocer Varela speaks with them and offers a solution to a problem they say goes back two years.
“We still lack the same medications — cyclophosphamide, vincristine, daunorubicin — and in the face of the indolence of the federal government … nine of us parents decided to begin an indefinite hunger strike outside the ministry offices as an act of nonviolent civil disobedience to put pressure on the [government],” said Luis Olvera, a father participating in the protest.
He and other parents said they will hold the federal government responsible for any physical damages they may incur during their hunger strike.
“We don’t want to come out here. We know that we’re putting ourselves at risk, but we have to do it because they’re always shrugging us off. They promise us that there won’t be a shortage, and the situation in the hospitals doesn’t change. [They] don’t even answer our calls,” said Olvera.
The Health Ministry announced on Monday that a plane carrying cancer medications arrived from Argentina, but the protesting parents said that they have yet to be distributed. The medicines must first be inspected by the federal health regulatory agency before that can happen.
A group of seamstresses in Tabasco has warned President López Obrador that “blood will flow” if the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) cuts their power again for failing to pay their bill.
In a video posted to social media, the head of the Exótica Textiles cooperative in Macuspana – the municipality where López Obrador was born and raised – said that CFE personnel most recently cut the power in their factory while they were rushing to complete an order of face masks to help stop the spread of Covid-19.
Alicia Jiménez said the seamstresses held the president personally responsible for the power cut.
She said that the cooperative is part of the “civil resistance” movement against the state-owned electricity company, which was initiated by López Obrador after his defeat in the 1994 election for governor of Tabasco, allegedly due to electoral fraud.
Jiménez said the president had promised to meet with them to discuss the issue of electricity rates but asked them to be patient. A year and a half after he took office, López Obrador has failed to keep his word, she said.
Advierten a AMLO: si nos cortan la luz habrá sangre
A spokeswoman for the seamstresses gave a fiery speech before the camera in video for President López Obrador.
“He doesn’t want to help us,” Jiménez said.
She also said that the seamstresses haven’t received any support from state or federal authorities to help them through the coronavirus-induced economic slump.
“We do what we can to get by; we have a contract to make face masks but … the [electricity] commission says, ‘go and cut off their power.’ It’s not fair, if we don’t have anything to eat, why do they take away the little we have,” Jiménez said.
“Don’t forget this message [López Obrador], you’re responsible for what happens. … Maybe a lot of people want to see this factory destroyed but … we’re not going to allow it. … If these people come back to disconnect the electricity, a tragedy could happen, we don’t know. … We’re not going to allow them to cut the power.”
At the conclusion of the video, one of the other seamstresses said that the cooperative is the “sustenance of our families” and they won’t allow it to be destroyed by the authorities.
The remains of a cannon found by divers off the coast of Quintana Roo. Laura Carrillo Márquez
Underwater archaeologists have rediscovered the remains of a sailing ship that is believed to have been wrecked off the coast of Quintana Roo in the late 18th or early 19th century.
Archaeologists with the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) found the anchor and 2.5-meter-long cannon of what is believed to have been an English sailing ship at the southeastern corner of Banco Chinchorro, an atoll reef lying off the coast of the southern Quintana Roo municipality of Othón P. Blanco.
They also discovered pig iron ingots that are believed to have been used as ballast in the ship.
The wreck was first spotted by local fisherman Manuel Polanco, who took engineer and underwater archaeology enthusiast Peter Tattersfield to the site in the 1990s.
Tattersfield recently approached the underwater archaeology department of INAH and a team was put together to explore the more than 200-year-old shipwreck that has been named after Polanco, an octogenarian who is now retired.
Ship’s anchor has become embedded in the coral. Laura Carrillo Márquez
The erstwhile fisherman and discoverer of several other shipwrecks is no longer able to go to sea because of his advanced age but his son, Benito Polanco, guided the INAH team to the site.
The archaeologists believe that the crew members made a last-ditch effort to save the ship by throwing the anchor overboard in an attempt to tether it to the atoll reef, INAH said in a statement on Tuesday.
They reached that conclusion because the anchor was completely integrated in the coral system of Banco Chinchorro, which has long been colloquially known as the quitasueños – nightmare or sleep-robbing – reef because of its treacherousness.
The “Manuel Polanco,” as the wreck is now known, is the 70th shipwreck to be documented by INAH archaeologists in the Banco Chinchorro natural reserve.
Laura Carrillo Márquez, an INAH archaeologist and head of the team that explored the wreck, said that a lot of details about the ship, such as its size and exact age, have not yet been determined because the site is in a “complex” location where there are strong currents.
However, further exploration is planned after the coronavirus restrictions are eased, she said.
Carrillo said the scientists haven’t found any of the wooden hull of the wrecked ship because it would have disintegrated over the hundreds of years it was left in the Caribbean sea water.
She said that the anchor and cannon were consistent with English designs from the 18th century but stressed that the hypothesis that the ship was British has not yet been confirmed.
My dad is a political scientist and a passionate political activist. As children, my sister and I heard countless speeches about what the powers-that-be were actively trying to do, and what they were actively trying to prevent.
They didn’t like poor people or black people (Oh Dad, please!), and worked hard to make sure their kids didn’t have to go to school with them. Speaking of school, he always believed there was a concerted effort to make history classes both boring and incomplete, never getting past World War II in subject matter — basically, the last time that the U.S. could really be widely considered heroes.
He explained why a “flat tax” was not actually the fair idea that it sounded like: 20% of a poor person’s income accounts for a lot more of their essential income than 20% of a rich person’s income. Credit cards were evil and designed to put people into permanent debt so that others could make money off them indefinitely.
And when it came to energy, he assured us that oil companies gave (and I quote) “beau coops” of money to make sure that energy policy favored the use of fossil fuels and gave priority to their continued use even though it was not in the best interest of the environment. Why else would we have so many cars and so few options for public transport?
We always thought he was being hyperbolic. Now we know that his “radical” ideas and resistance in “going with the flow” were pretty much right on the money.
So, here we are.
I am interrupting my regularly-scheduled coronavirus-related hand-wringing to gasp and puzzle over something else: why on earth Mexico is not running with open arms toward becoming the leader in clean energy production that it was poised to become a very short time ago.
We’ve got everything we need to get the ball rolling. A variety of clean energy companies at the ready, many with experience in selling energy to the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) already at a greatly-reduced price, and with a multitude of investors ready to make sure it happens.
The country, and the world, are ready. While environmental degradation is literally carrying us all into a free fall at an accelerated pace, our actual environmental policy seems to be saying, “What’s the problem? Look, we’re still in the air, relax!”
I’d like us to focus on the first question there: what’s the problem?
If you’re to believe CFE chief Manuel Bartlett, the problem is that private renewable energy companies are corrupt and literally cheating and robbing the poor, defenseless CFE. (I mean seriously, what is it with powerful men here — and everywhere, I suppose — that they’re so good at simultaneously holding on to inordinate amounts of power while throwing themselves dramatically on the ground in a show of unparalleled victimhood? Did they all learn it from watching professional soccer matches?)
Then there’s AMLO (sigh). He’s said that private energy companies “contribute nothing,” and I think it’s worth examining why he’d say something like this when it’s clearly not true. He must, of course, know that it’s not true, so what’s the deal?
From the same article: “Private energy companies generate 46% of the nation’s electricity, according to the Energy Regulatory Commission (CRE), and they do so at a cost up to 85% less than the CFE.”
My suspicion is that he’s made a deal with the CFE to ensure they stay in business and don’t lose money. Perhaps that seemed like a logical extension of his animosity toward and suspicion of private industry in general, a way for him to stay faithfully “on message” before his supporters.
To some extent, I get it: I am also generally suspicious of for-profit services. But my goodness, his penchant for putting his foot down on some large organizations that cheat and turning a blind eye to others is disingenuous, to say the least.
And besides, whatever happened to his promise of “letting the people decide,” of putting everything to a vote? It seems that’s only a route to take when it’s convenient. Other times, it’s a condescending “no, no, no, people just aren’t smart enough to get this complex issue.”
Maybe they aren’t, but my goodness, stop saying then that it’s the only way to do things. Why not surround yourself with qualified, forward-thinking people who are smart enough to understand it and not only to make a good decision, but explain their conclusions in layman’s terms?
I hope he sees that he would be even more “on message” by giving the green light to create jobs for thousands of Mexicans who, especially now, desperately need them. Even if this does eventually get fixed, what kind of confidence will future investors have here next time we need it?
The investment, in this case, is not simply a cheap labor-motivated “race to the bottom.” This investment is revolutionary, and has the potential to put Mexico on the map as a world leader in renewable energy. AMLO, please don’t hold us back here! Those who are fighting for renewable energy’s place in our policy, please keep fighting (thanks governors and Mario Molina for speaking up)! This is not over.
I see a future in which Mexico is a leader in the Americas for clean energy. The hardest part of this whole thing seems to be getting some very large egos out of the way.
Try some humility, people. It’s good for us all.
Sarah DeVries writes from her home in Xalapa, Veracruz.
Farmworkers on the road, heading north to find work.
Day laborers from the mountains of Guerrero are migrating by the thousands to the fields of Baja California, Chihuahua, Sinaloa, Guanajuato, Michoacán and Zacatecas despite stay-at-home orders due to the coronavirus pandemic and high levels of infection in some of those areas.
Some farmworkers are even traveling to the United States to look for work. In San Pedro de la Laguna, 250 of the town’s 1,000 inhabitants are working on the other side of the border.
Residents of the poverty-stricken region have no choice but to leave if they and their families are to eat. Around 8,000 men, women and children in Guerrero are predicted to migrate north to find work this season, where they will toil in the fields for between 120 and 250 pesos a day (US $5.40 to $11.18).
“Migration does not stop despite the pandemic. There is an increase in the number of migrants because there is an economic situation of extreme poverty in the mountain communities, which have poverty levels similar to those of sub-Saharan Africa, which is now worsened by the increase in food prices due to Covid-19,” says Paulino Rodríguez Reyes of the Tlachinollan Human Rights Center.
He said buses leave every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, carrying as many as 150 workers each.
Workers wait to board northbound buses in Guerrero.
Around 2,000 people have already left the state this month.
Each year around 30,000 mainly indigenous day laborers from the Guerrero mountains earn their living this way, and this year they are traveling without masks or hand sanitizer and in crowded conditions.
Sometimes large agricultural export companies will recruit them and send buses, but this year many are making the journey on their own dime.
The first season lasts from September to January, with a second season beginning in May.
Doctor Alejandro Morales Ibarra, who helps care for rural workers, says this year has been atypical, with a 50% increase in migration, especially among students aged 14 to 20 who have taken the opportunity generated by the suspension of classes to earn money.
Activist Abel Barrera Hernández proposes that the Ministry of Labor help protect day laborers who travel to other states and those who return to their towns against the coronavirus, as well as compel employers to do the same.
A coalition of day laborer organizations, experts and activists released a report earlier this month detailing a number of steps governments and employers can take to help keep those who travel to the fields safe, including enforcing hygiene measures and offering workers access to health care.
In the poorest areas of Guerrero, others hope the federal government will step in with scholarships, subsidies and food, as raising corn in the region is no longer a viable solution to staving off hunger.
According to the National Network of Day Laborers, there are almost 3 million migrant day laborers in Mexico, of which 2.5 million are indigenous.
Federal officials meet with state governors to discuss reopening strategies.
The federal government’s plan to reopen the economy gradually on a state by state basis starting June 1 — even as the coronavirus pandemic worsens — has divided governors, with some supporting the move and others saying it is too soon.
The state leaders have largely split along party lines, the newspaper El Economista reported, noting that all 10 National Action Party (PAN) governors are in favor of a gradual reopening starting on Monday.
In contrast, most of the 12 Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) governors and six Morena party leaders are planning to wait longer to reopen the economies in their states, which include those with the largest active outbreaks of Covid-19: Mexico City, México state, Veracruz, Tabasco, Baja California and Puebla.
Morelos’ Social Encounter Party governor, Cuauhtémoc Blanco, also believes that a gradual reopening on June 1 is too soon but Citizens Movement Governor Enrique Alfaro of Jalisco, Democratic Revolution Party Governor Silvano Aureoles of Michoacán and independent Governor Jaime Rodríguez of Nuevo León share the same view as the PAN leaders.
‘We’re on our own path, we have our own stoplight system,’ said Jalisco’s Alfaro, left.
After a virtual meeting with the governors on Tuesday, Interior Minister Olga Sánchez stressed that it will be the federal government – not state authorities – that decides when economic and everyday activities can resume in each federal entity.
“We cannot have … local stoplight systems because there would be a complete lack of coordination. We have to have federal coordination,” Sánchez said, emphasizing that there will be constant dialogue with the governors so that everyone’s on the same page.
Her remarks came after Guanajuato’s PAN governor, Diego Sinhué, presented his own stoplight system to guide the reactivation of the economy in that state. Governor Alfaro of Jalisco also said that his state will follow its own reopening plan, although he added that his administration will take the federal government’s view into account.
“What I think is curious is that they’re talking about coordination from the [federal] government when there wasn’t any for 2 1/2 months. … We’re on our [own] path, we have our own stoplight system. … We’ll take the federal one into account … but we’ll continue with the route we’ve planned,” he said.
Alfaro said that all the indicators in Jalisco – where there are currently 400 active coronavirus cases, according to official statistics – are “on green” but stressed that the economic reopening will be gradual and that residents will not be free to roam the streets as they please from Monday on.
Alfaro and Sinhué along with the PAN governors of Aguascalientes, Baja California Sur, Chihuahua, Durango, Nayarit, Querétaro, Quintana Roo, Tamaulipas and Yucatán as well as Colima’s PRI Governor José Ignacio Peralta all support a gradual reopening of the economy starting Monday.
Sánchez acknowledged that some governors are “chomping at the bit” to reopen their economies and want to do so according to their own timetable but reiterated that that the federal government’s position is non-negotiable. “The stoplight system is federal,” she declared.
Deputy Health Minister Hugo López-Gatell, the federal government’s coronavirus point man, also made it clear that states will not be permitted to ease restrictions as they see fit.
“Every federal entity will obviously have a different color according to their [local] epidemic. … The risk rating given to each state will be variable in each state each week,” López-Gatell said.
He explained that the federal government will inform state governments of the color they will be allocated for the following week on Tuesdays after which there will be an opportunity for dialogue between the parties.
The stoplight color allocated to each state will be publicly announced on Fridays and the restrictions that apply to each color will take effect the following Monday, López-Gatell said.
Stoplight colors allocated to the states will be announced on Fridays, said López-Gatell.
He said that the states will have the option of implementing stricter coronavirus mitigation measures than those stipulated by the stoplight color they are allocated but cannot relax measures before the federal government gives them the authority to do so.
The federal government has not yet publicly announced what factors will be taken into consideration to determine whether a state is allocated a red, orange, yellow or green light but Yucatán Governor Mauricio Vila said Tuesday night that the criteria had been explained in private to the state leaders.
He said in an interview that four factors will be taken into account to determine each state’s readiness to return to what has been dubbed “the new normal”: the number of beds available for patients with serious respiratory symptoms, hospital admission trends for Covid-19 patients, the coronavirus reproduction rate (the number of people each infected person infects) and the positivity rate (the percentage of people tested who are confirmed to have Covid-19).
In “red” states, only essential economic activities will be permitted including the newly-designated sectors of construction, mining and automotive. Other sectors will be permitted to resume operations once the stoplight switches to orange but with a reduced capacity and/or workforce and with restrictions in place to prevent the spread of Covid-19. Public spaces will also be reopened but at a reduced capacity.
Businesses will be able to increase their workforces and capacity once their state has been allocated a yellow light and there will be fewer restrictions in open-air public spaces. However, stricter restrictions will remain in force in indoor spaces such as restaurants, cinemas and theaters.
Once a state is given a green light, students will return to school and other educational institutions and all remaining restrictions on economic and everyday activities will be lifted.
There are currently almost 15,000 active Covid-19 cases in Mexico, the highest level since it was first detected in Mexico at the end of February.
Outdated infrastructure was blamed for this sinkhole in Nuevo Laredo.
A mother and daughter were rescued unharmed after their car was swallowed by a sinkhole caused by intense rains in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, early Tuesday morning.
The sinkhole opened up beneath their 2010 Volkswagen Jetta at around 5:30 a.m., but despite the spectacular nature of the incident, the car remained right-side-up and the mother and her young daughter were not injured.
Firefighters and Civil Protection rescuers arrived on the scene to find the two on top of their car, which was surrounded by water and mud at the bottom of the hole, which was more than five meters below street level.
The two were quickly rescued and sent to hospital for medical evaluations, and the area was cordoned off to allow authorities to remove the car.
A representative of the local water authority said the sinkhole opened up due to outdated infrastructure, as the over 40-year-old drainage system in the neighborhood where it occurred is in need of maintenance.
Local media reported that Tuesday morning’s incident was not the first time a sinkhole has opened up at that particular intersection due to heavy rains.
The inclement weather continued into Tuesday morning and afternoon, and other sinkholes were also reported in the city, as well as the flooding of major roads. The public was been alerted to take extreme caution.
The municipal government announced that the route to the local airport along the highway to Monterrey will be closed for two and a half months in order to carry out repairs and avoid a possible collapse there in the future.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has applauded the work and the measures put in place by the government to combat the spread of the coronavirus.
“The WHO wishes to congratulate the government of Mexico for the firm social and public health measures it has adopted to date, including the imposition of strict restrictions on movement and the temporary stoppage of the activity of large companies to limit the spread of Covid-19,” the international organization wrote in a letter posted Tuesday to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Twitter account, congratulating President López Obrador on his government’s response to the health crisis.
The WHO also pointed out that the federal government’s financial aid plan “demonstrates its long-term vision of the way to go and its willingness to prioritize the interests of its citizens.”
In Mexico, the aid plan has been widely criticized for not going far enough to help small and medium sized businesses weather the crisis and continue to provide employment.
The international organization also applauded the decision of the government to maintain restrictive measures.
“The world will not be able to beat this virus until all member states are able to detect suspicious cases and test them, as well as locate and isolate the contacts of the sick.”
With a population of around 120 million, Mexico has only conducted about 230,000 coronavirus tests, one of the lowest rates in the Western Hemisphere, and Mexico has seen more deaths thus far than China.
Mexico, which did not declare a health emergency until March 30, had 74,560 confirmed cases of the coronavirus as of Tuesday, when deaths reached a record high of 501 in a single day, bringing the total coronavirus death toll to 8,134.
Santiago Nieto: an economic and security crisis coming.
Violence and crime will increase as a result of the coronavirus-induced economic crisis, predict two federal officials.
The head of the government’s Financial Intelligence Unit warned that violence and certain crimes will increase as coronavirus restrictions are eased and Mexico enters what has been dubbed “the new normal.”
Speaking at a “justice, transparency and Covid-19” conference on Tuesday, Santiago Nieto bluntly declared that an economic and security “crisis is obviously coming.”
He predicted that burglaries, financial fraud, human trafficking and child pornography offenses will be among the crimes that will increase. Mexico’s court system will consequently come under significant pressure, Nieto said.
For his part, the head of the Federal Protection Service, a division of the Security Ministry, told the newspaper El Universal that Mexico is likely to go through a “very rough” period of insecurity in the next three to six months.
Manuel Espino: a rough period of insecurity during next three to six months.
Commissioner Manuel Espino Barrientos said the coronavirus pandemic and the economic downturn caused by the mitigation measures put in place to limit the spread of the virus will leave Mexico in a “very complicated” security situation.
Violence and crime will increase because a lot of people “will not find work but they will be hungry,” Espino said.
“We could go through a very rough period of insecurity. It’s a common sense forecast that must be taken into account,” he said.
The warnings of the two officials are particularly ominous given that violence is already at extremely high levels despite authorities urging citizens to stay in their homes for the past two months.
Security Minister Alfonso Durazo highlighted last week that homicide numbers declined by 1.66% in April to 2,950 but failed to mention that the average daily number of murders during the 30 days of last month was in fact higher than the daily average during the 31 days of March.
Homicide numbers for the first four months of the year show that 2020 is currently on track to supersede 2019 as the most violent year on record.
There were 11,535 homicides in the first four months of the year, according to data from the National Public Security System, a 2.4% increase compared to the same period of 2019.
