A group meets for a boxing class in Mexico City in late May in preparation for this month's Guinness World Records event. Facebook / Clase Masiva de Box Ciudad de México
The world’s largest ever boxing lesson will take place in Mexico City’s central square Saturday morning.
More than 19,000 people have registered and received kits with an official T-shirt, hat and number, the director of Mexico City’s Institute of Sport, Javier Hidalgo, told a press conference Friday.
A turnout of that size will easily beat the existing Guinness World Record for the largest boxing lesson, which was set in Russia in 2017 with 3,000 participants. Based on whether they received a green, white or red t-shirt, registered participants will be directed to one of three different sections of the central square for the lesson. Collectively they will form a representation of the Mexican flag. A fourth section just off the zócalo will be open to people who haven’t registered.
Three champion boxers – Ana María Torres, David Picasso and Mariana Juárez – will lead the lesson, which will commence at 8 a.m. Many other past and present professional boxers will be on hand to offer tips to budding boxers, including former heavyweight champion Andy Ruiz, a Mexican American.
Champion boxers Mariana “La Barby” Juárez, Ana María Torres and David Picasso will lead the Saturday class. Facebook / Clase Masiva de Box Ciudad de México
Boxing legend Saúl “Canelo” Álvarez has promoted the boxing class and there has been some speculation that he would attend, but that hasn’t been confirmed. Sylvester Stallone, who stars in the Rocky boxing movies, also appeared in a promotional video for the event, telling his Mexican friends to show up at 8 a.m. and “keep punching.”
Among the promising pugilists who will be at the zócalo bright and early Saturday are about 10 residents of a Mexico City shelter for homeless people. The young men have been training under the watchful eye of a man affectionately called El Profe (The Teacher), a boxing enthusiast who moved to the same shelter when the hotel where he was living shut down.
Canelo’s advice in a social media video message to promote the #ClaseMasivaDeBox appears to have resonated with the men.
“Sport is the best way to better yourself in life,” the 31-year-old Guadalajara native said in the promotional video. “A true champion puts addictions out of the fight. … That’s why I want to invite you to the Mexico City zócalo for the world’s largest boxing lesson. Don’t miss it!”
Juan Toscano-Anderson grew up in Oakland, but his mother is from Michoacán. Twitter / @juanonjuan10
The NBA title won by the Golden State Warriors on Thursday night included a significant piece of history for basketball fans from Baja California to Chiapas: Juan Toscano-Anderson became the first Mexican NBA champion.
“JTA” — as he is often called by fans of the former Oakland team that now has its home arena in San Francisco — didn’t get to play in his team’s series clinching 103-90 victory over the Boston Celtics in Game 6 of the NBA Finals, but that didn’t stop him from celebrating in the best way he knew how: grabbing the tricolor flag as he and his Warriors teammates whooped it up on the court in Boston after the game.
Though he was not born in Mexico, Toscano-Anderson was immersed in Mexican culture while being raised in Oakland, California, in the 1990s and early 2000s, largely because his mother, Patricia Toscano, had emigrated from Michoacán a few decades earlier, along with her father.
“Despite me being born in the States, I consider myself Mexican,” he told The Pajaronian newspaper in 2019, when he was playing for a Warriors’ minor league team in Santa Cruz, California.
Toscano-Anderson grabbed a Mexican flag to celebrate his team’s championship win.
His professional career started a few years before that in the Liga Nacional de Baloncesto Profesional (LNBP) in Mexico. After not being selected in the 2015 NBA draft following four nondescript seasons at Marquette University, he played one season with the Mexicali Soles and two seasons for the Monterrey Fuerza Regia.
“Sometimes I miss Fuerza Regia and Monterrey, really. Someday I want to return to the LNBP to play for a year or two,” said Toscano-Anderson, who is 29 years old and 1.98 meters (6 feet, 6 inches) tall. While in Mexico, he was named the league MVP once, made two all-star game appearances and led Fuerza Regia to two league championships — and the name on the back of his jersey was “Toscano,” as opposed to “Anderson” in college.
“Nito,” as he is called by family and friends, is all about his Mexican roots. During his three seasons with the Warriors, he often has taken pictures with the Mexican flag and donned tricolor items. When he competed in the NBA Slam Dunk Contest in February, not only did he take second place, but he did it wearing a pair of tricolor Nike sneakers and a specially designed, tricolor-tinged Warriors jersey.
Going into the NBA Finals, there was a lot of attention on him as the first player of Mexican heritage to make it that far in the playoffs. “I want to thank all my people from Mexico,” he said on the sports website Archysport. “I am doing this for Mexico and hopefully I can take the trophy to Mexico and celebrate in Monterrey, Cancún, Michoacán, Mexico City. I’m going to be there this summer and hopefully I can bring the trophy to celebrate with all of you.”
Juan Toscano-Anderson’s Mexico-themed Warriors jersey and kicks for the dunk contest 🇲🇽🔥 pic.twitter.com/bZjEtKnntn
Two years ago, on an off-season visit to Mexico with some of his Warriors teammates, while they were enjoying beach time, Toscano-Anderson was on an outdoor basketball court in Monterrey signing autographs for hundreds of elementary school students.
“I felt like a rock star, man,” he told the San Francisco Chronicle newspaper.“What Steph [Curry] and those guys are like [in the U.S.], that’s kind of what I’m like in Mexico. And I say that humbly. It’s just a total honor.”
Toscano-Anderson was in the final year of his contract this season, so it remains to be seen if he will return to the Warriors next season. He has played parts of three seasons with the team, and though the Golden State dynasty has won four NBA titles in the past eight years, the latest one was a big one for Toscano-Anderson since it was his first.
In addition to playing pro ball in Mexico, he also played in leagues in Venezuela and Argentina and had a stint with the Mexican national team in a pre-Olympic tournament.
Toscano-Anderson has played for Monterrey’s Fuerza Regia and other Mexican basketball teams. Fuerza Regia
He got his big chance by doing well at an open tryout in 2018 and getting signed to play with the Warriors’ minor league team in Santa Cruz, California. He made his NBA debut at the advanced age of 26 during the 2019-20 season, but played in only 13 games that year. Last season, he went back and forth between Golden State and Santa Cruz on a two-way contract, and this season he earned $1.7 million.
In an interview with the newspaper El Heraldo, he said, “I don’t do it for money. I don’t care if I’m on a two-way deal or making $2 million a year. I wake up every day for the love of this sport.”
Toscano-Anderson’s No. 95 jersey is a nod to his maternal grandfather, who moved from Chavinda, Michoacán, in the 1960s and bought a house on 95th Avenue in Oakland. “Nito” grew up there with his Mexican mother and Puerto Rican father, and much of his upbringing involved celebrating Mexican holidays, constantly hearing Spanish all around him and eating his grandmother’s Mexican food.
He is the NBA’s first player of Mexican descent since Jorge Gutiérrez in 2016. Other former NBA players with Mexican blood include Eduardo Nájera, Gustavo Ayón and Horacio Llamas.
A Mexico City court has ordered tech giant Google to pay more than 4 billion pesos (US $196.4 million) to a Mexican lawyer for allowing defamatory information to be published about him on a blogging platform it owns.
Ulrich Richter Morales, a criminal lawyer, initiated legal action against the multinational technology company in 2015 due to its hosting on its Blogger platform of a blog that linked him to drug trafficking, money laundering and the falsification of documents.
The blog, which remains online, but hasn’t been updated since 2014, was published under the title Ulrich Richter Morales y sus chingaderas a la patria (Ulrich Richter Morales and his despicable deeds against the homeland). The identity of its creator is not publicly known.
The Mexico City Superior Court of Justice ruled earlier this week that Google must take responsibility for what was determined to be moral damage to Richter due to the publication of libel on the blog. A Google spokesperson described the penalty as arbitrary, excessive, baseless and in violation of the right to free speech. The company vowed to challenge the ruling, and the case could end up in the Supreme Court.
Richter said the penalty imposed on Google was “based on the economic capacity of the offender,” which he described as “one of the five richest companies in the world.”
Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company, is currently the world’s fourth most valuable company by market cap. Google should have removed the blog but didn’t and is now facing the legal consequences, Richter said.
The bus that was carrying pilgrims from a visit to Tila.
Nine people were killed and 28 others were injured in a bus accident early Friday in northeastern Chiapas.
The victims were pilgrims from Tabasco who on Thursday visited a church in the municipality of Tila, Chiapas, where El Señor de Tila – a revered representation of Jesus Christ – is housed.
Chiapas Civil Protection authorities said that a bus overturned at about 5:30 a.m. Friday near Belisario Domínguez, a community in Tila, which borders Tabasco. The driver lost control of the vehicle as he rounded a curve on a wet road. The passengers were on their way home.
Three of the 28 people injured were said to be in critical condition and were receiving treatment in a Tila hospital. Locals and motorists offered initial assistance to the bus passengers before emergency services arrived.
Groups of pilgrims commonly travel to important religious sites by bus. Seven people, including three children, were killed in a bus accident while on a pilgrimage in Oaxaca in April, while 19 pilgrims were killed in a crash in southern México state last November.
Bireki at Zacango Ecological Park in México state. Twitter / @FillatNapo
Thirty-year-old Bireki, the first Asian elephant to be born and raised in captivity in Mexico, left the Zacango Ecological Park for her new, permanent home in the Ostok Animal Protection & Sanctuary on Thursday.
Rescued from a Veracruz circus in 2014, Bireki has spent the last nine years at the Zacango Park being looked after by staff as part of their Bienestar Animal (Animal Wellbeing) program. There, her health, weight, and diet were managed to ensure she fully recovered from her years as a circus elephant in captivity.
“She arrived at the Parque Ecológico Zacango nine years ago, from that moment on I just want to say thank you to all of the staff at the park for all their love and care for this elephant,” said the director of México state’s Commission for Natural Parks and Wildlife (Cepanaf), Napoleón Fillat Ordóñez.
Bireki’s new home, the Ostok Sanctuary in Culiacán, Sinaloa, is a 21-hectare reserve where resident animals live in an environment as close to their natural one as possible, with minimal human contact, except in cases where they need special care. The sanctuary has taken in 400 animals endangered because of loss of natural habitat or rescued from illegal trafficking or other abusive situations. Some of these animals have been rehabilitated and released back into the wild, while others have been able to live out their days in safety at the sanctuary.
El nuevo hogar de Bireki 🏠🐘
🐘La elefanta asiática de nombre Bireki nació en un circo hace 31 años. Fue la primera de sus especie en nacer en territorio mexicano. pic.twitter.com/7PBp2H3UtG
Bireki, the first Mexican-born Asian elephant, as a baby.
Last July, Ostok received “Big Boy” at their facilities, now one of their most famous residents. Another Asian elephant, Big Boy was owned by a circus for 30 years and found chained in Jalisco in 2021, following a law that was passed in 2015 outlawing the use of animals in the circus. Asian elephants are considered endangered across the globe, due to loss of habitat and the continued threat of poaching.
When Bireki arrives in Culiacán, she will be quarantined for 45 days in the same temporarily shelter that housed Big Boy upon his arrival. There she will be monitored to see how she adapts to the climate. Once given the OK, she will meet her new neighbor Big Boy on the grounds of the sanctuary.
Mauricio Merino Huerta, director of the University of Guadalajara's anti-corruption research institute. YouTube screenshot / IIRCCC
Mexico has the tools needed to combat corruption but isn’t using them, according to a University of Guadalajara (UDG) academic.
Mauricio Merino Huerta, director of the UDG’s Accountability and Corruption Fighting Research Institute (IIRCCC), compared the National Anti-Corruption System (SNA) and anti-corruption laws to a plane that isn’t used, a topical comparison given that President López Obrador – who styles himself as Mexico’s chief corruption fighter – refuses to use the presidential plane but has been unable to sell it.
“We have a very good institutional design, a good instrument to combat the phenomenon of corruption but it isn’t used. We have a parked plane that isn’t being used,” Merino told the newspaper El Universal.
Established by the 2012-18 government led by former president Enrique Peña Nieto, the SNA consists of a range of a range of different institutions, among which are the Ministry of Public Administration, the National Institute of Transparency, the Federal Auditor’s Office and the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office. The system is coordinated by an executive secretariat, which López Obrador hopes to abolish.
The SNA was founded in 2016, during the Peña Nieto administration. Network for Integrity
Merino said that an IIRCCC study found that the SNA institutions have shirked their corruption-fighting roles since the system was established in 2015. López Obrador – who has been criticized for showing little interest in the SNA – is not to blame, the academic said, asserting that procrastination is an entrenched problem in Mexico’s political system.
“The SNA was promulgated in the six-year term of Enrique Peña Nieto, but it wasn’t completed and to put it bluntly there was an open boycott of the system from the Peña Nieto government, while the López Obrador government has spurned it,” Merino said. “… The combined result is that [the SNA institutions] have not fulfilled their mandates,” he said.
Merino said the government’s claim that it has put an end to impunity for corruption isn’t backed up by data. In 2020, the IIRCCC found that only nine of over 30,000 probes into presumed acts of corruption had progressed to the next stage of investigation.
Merino also raised concerns about transfers of over 30 billion pesos (US $1.46 billion) to military trusts. “They should give a clear account [about the money] given that they’ve criticized [public] trusts so much,” he said.
Former Pemex CEO Emilio Lozoya and ex-cabinet minister Rosario Robles are two high-profile functionaries accused of corruption. Both are currently in pre-trial detention.
“That’s something else. We think that it’s necessary and correct to punish those who commit acts of corruption, without a doubt, but the problem is systemic, it’s the system as a whole that’s … [corrupted]. An antidote was designed for that, which is the SNA. The plane is on the runway but it doesn’t have a pilot,” he said.
Merino, a political scientist and sociologist who has worked at universities in Mexico and abroad, told El Universal that the IIRCCC study determined that many of the officials employed at SNA institutions were not appointed on merit. Rather, people were given positions because of their political views, their links to political parties or their personal friendships, he said. Resources assigned to the institutions are used discretionally for political purposes, Merino added.
The 2021-22 edition of the Latin America Anti-Corruption Assessment, completed by the New York City Bar Association’s Cyrus R. Vance Center for International Justice, also stated that the fight against corruption is being used for political purposes. However, Mexico’s overall anti-corruption score did improve slightly, rising to 5.64 out of 10 compared to 5.51 a year earlier.
López Obrador has a much higher opinion of his administration’s anti-corruption efforts, and even declared less than a year after taking office that there is “zero corruption” in the federal government as a result of his dedication to “sweeping away” what had developed over the past 30 years.
He gave a more sober assessment this week, telling reporters at his regular news conference on Wednesday that his government continues to combat corruption “poco a poco,” or bit by bit. The president made an embarrassing slip of the tongue at the same conference, asserting that “a government without corruption is completely useless,” before correcting himself when a reporter questioned him about his remark.
Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard at the Mexican Olympic Committee offices in Mexico City on Thursday. Facebook / Marcelo Ebrard
Mexico’s Olympic Committee and its Ministry of Foreign Affairs have signed an agreement to promote Mexican athletics that they hope will lead to Mexico hosting the 2036 Summer Olympics, Foreign Affairs Minister Marcelo Ebrard announced Thursday.
“Let’s make a plan so that we can take it to the president of the republic, and if he authorizes it, then we will start working with all Mexican authorities so that we have the Olympic Games in Mexico in 2036,” he said in a ceremony held in Plaza Olímpica outside the Olympic Committee’s offices in Mexico City.
The last time Mexico hosted the Olympics was in 1968 when, after failed bids to land the 1956 and 1960 games, Mexico City played host to the XIX Olympiad from October 12 to 27.
Those games were notable for a number of reasons— from the Mexican army’s October 2 massacre of 200 to 400 unarmed students who were protesting the upcoming Olympics to U.S. medal-winners Tommie Smith and John Carlos raising their fists on the victory stand in a salute to Black power to American Bob Beamon leaping 8.9 meters in the long jump for an Olympic record that still stands 54 years later.
The Mexican military detains protesters at what came to be known as the Tlatelolco massacre of 1968.
Beamon’s jump, which broke the previous record by a whopping 55 centimeters, and other track and field events were affected by Mexico City being situated 2,240 meters above sea level; no other Summer Olympics before or since has been held at such a high elevation.
As Ebrard spoke glowingly about the prospect of Mexico hosting its second Olympics, he was flanked by several elite Mexican athletes, including past Olympic medalists. He pointed to their “spirit” and “conviction” as a driving force behind his efforts.
Toward the end of his remarks, Ebrard proclaimed, “If we could bring another Olympics to Mexico, why not?”
Later on Twitter, he added: “If President López Obrador authorizes it, we will begin.”
En el Comité Olímpico Mexicano me preguntan ¿ Y si hacemos otra Olimpiada en nuestro país ? Les respondo ¿porqué no? Sí podemos. Si autoriza el Presidente López Obrador,empezamos. pic.twitter.com/CSzVKlo20y
On Facebook, he wrote: “Thanks to the effort of teams, athletes, coaches, trainers, all the people who dedicate their lives to their disciplines, Mexico has an outstanding role in international sport. Let’s go for more!”
The agreement was signed by Ebrard and Mexican Olympic Committee president Mary José Alcalá, a former world-class diver who had top-10 finishes in the Summer Games of 1988 in Seoul and 1992 in Barcelona. “We are your allies,” Alcalá, 50, stated.
The agreement is not a game plan for Mexico to pursue hosting the Olympics. Rather, it’s a pact that will promote and develop athletic endeavors within Mexico as well as provide support to athletes, coaches, directors and staff of Mexico’s sports federations and delegations when they compete throughout the world.
“This agreement is sports diplomacy, which means facilitating and supporting Mexican athletes” at home and on the international stage, Ebrard said. “Make life easier for them and promote the presence of Mexican sports in all spaces, in all sports competitions that we can.”
He also took a few seconds to address skeptics who said his talk of the Olympics is a political stunt, as Ebrard, who was appointed foreign minister by López Obrador in 2018, might be a candidate for president in 2024. His goal is one that transcends politics, he said, adding, “It’s going to take us 20 years. There’s going to be a lot of elections” in that time span.
The last Summer Olympics were held in 2021 in Tokyo, one year after their original dates because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The 2024 Summer Games will be in Paris, followed by 2028 in Los Angeles and 2032 in Brisbane, Australia. Ebrard said he was open to Mexico hosting in either 2036 or 2040.
“Time is not that important. We are not thinking about it for a short-term benefit, but for Mexico to be on the international scene,” he said. “It would be an honor for Mexico to be the venue again.”
Modern day pirates have carried out another heist in the Gulf of Mexico.
On Tuesday night, a group of 10 armed thieves stole equipment, tools, materials and other items from a Campeche Bay oil platform owned by the state oil company Pemex.
According to a Milenio newspaper report that cited platform workers, hooded thieves dressed in military-style attire arrived at the offshore pumping complex in three vessels at approximately 7 p.m.
They boarded the platform and subdued workers from Pemex and oil services company Grupo Evya. The thieves subsequently forced the workers to load valuables onto their boats. The plunder was completed in approximately three hours.
The crime was reported to the navy’s maritime traffic control center at 10:20 p.m. – about 20 minutes after the heist had ended. There were no reports of injuries.
The robbery came a month after a group of five pirates attacked a vessel in the Gulf of Mexico owned by the company Protexa. The thieves got away with equipment, tools and personal items worth more than 1.5 million pesos (US $73,000).
In January, thieves stole self-contained breathing apparatuses, radios and tools from a Campeche Bay oil rig in a 1.25-million-peso heist.
Pirate attacks on oil platforms and vessels in the Gulf of Mexico are relatively common. Some Pemex oil rig workers have said they’re afraid they could be killed while working and living offshore.
A 2020 study detailed the modus operandi of pirates who operate in the Gulf of Mexico. It said that pirates armed with guns, machetes and knives operate in groups of up to 15 to carry out attacks, usually at night. They use small boats with powerful motors to reach oil and gas platforms before stealing equipment and money from crew members. Pirates often carry radios tuned to navy bands to avoid detection.
The study also found that the response by the Mexican navy is usually slow, with vessels taking up to seven hours to reach the crime scene, giving pirates plenty of time to escape.
Firefighters put out a car fire caused by an armed gang sowing terror in San Cristobal de las Casas on Tuesday over control of extortion territory.
Crime groups control or are seeking to control public markets, commercial districts and the distribution of basic foodstuffs across much of Mexico — and in many cases, they’re willing to use violence to achieve their goals.
The tactics used by organized crime have come into sharp focus this week due to events in Guerrero and Chiapas, but the happenings there are preceded by similarly distressing occurrences in other states.
In Chilpancingo, a string of murders of people who worked in the poultry industry – including distributors of fresh chicken to markets – shut down most chicken stalls at the city’s markets this week. Meanwhile, a dispute over control of the largest market in San Cristóbal de las Casas triggered a frightening show of force from one crime group on Tuesday.
Organized crime’s desire to make money via extortion and broader criminal control of markets, commercial districts and food supply chains is far from unique to those cities. Extortion is a problem in most states, and business owners who don’t comply with criminals’ demands run the risk of paying for their decisions with their lives.
María del Carmen Ruiz Hernández, small business leader in Xalapa, Veracruz, was shot and killed in 2019, a crime attributed to organized crime groups operating protection rackets.
Cuauhtémoc Rivera, president of the national small business association ANPEC, told the newspaper Milenio that the only states where crime is not a significant problem in markets and other shopping areas are Yucatán, Aguascalientes and Querétaro. In much of the country, an increase in extortion demands and general insecurity has put businesses “against the wall,” he said.
Official data shows that México state has the worst extortion problem in the country, with almost 1,400 reported cases in the first four months of the year. The other states in the top five for extortion between January and April were Nuevo León, Guanajuato, Jalisco and Zacatecas. However, many such cases – if not the majority – go unreported.
In Guanajuato, 32 people have been killed in the businesses where they worked so far this year, according to Milenio. All but three of the attacks occurred in Celaya, a city where extortion has long been a problem. Among the businesses where the murders have occurred are auto repair shops, butchers, florists and market stalls. Most recently, the organizer of a tianguis, or outdoor market, was shot dead. Milenio also reported that decapitated human heads have been left outside public markets in Celaya on at least two occasions this year.
In Veracruz, four vendors of food products have been murdered this year. Two of the victims were butchers in Coatzacoalcos who were apparently killed for refusing to make extortion payments. Two female fruit and vegetable vendors were murdered in Cosoleacaque for the same reason last November. Milenio reported that the failure to make extortion payments has also led to businesses being set on fire and homes being shot at in the Gulf coast state. Violence related to the refusal to pay extortion has been a problem in Veracruz for years.
In southern México state, criminal groups have controlled the distribution and sale of products such as chicken, eggs, tortillas, cigarettes and construction materials for years, according to residents who spoke with Milenio. Residents of Sultepec, a municipality on the border with Guerrero, say that the prices for many products are high because criminals monopolize the market.
Extortion is also a major problem in the metropolitan area of Toluca, the México state capital, where fresh chicken shops have been one of the main targets. Four chicken and egg vendors at the city’s main wholesale market were murdered in 2020 for failing to make extortion payments.
In neighboring Guerrero, former bishop Salvador Rangel Mendoza said late last year that the distribution of beer and soft drinks was among the activities of crime groups. Earlier this month, violence and threats from organized crime forced tortilla shops, schools and public transport to shut down in Zihuatanejo, a Guerrero resort town.
Rivera said that crime groups control markets for certain products in the cities of Acapulco, Chilpancingo and Taxco – all located in Guerrero – as well as in Ixtapan de la Sal, a México state municipality close to the border with Guerrero. In some cases, they steal goods from distributors and sell them themselves, but crime groups’ main way of controlling a market is by collecting extortion payments from business owners and/or forcing them to buy products at inflated prices from certain suppliers under their influence.
While crime groups start out extorting stable small businesses, in some places, even more informal businesses are targeted.
“They fix the final prices,” Rivera said, referring to crime group’s influence over retailers. The ANPEC chief also said that the size of typical extortion payments – usually paid monthly or weekly – has increased from 200 pesos to 500 pesos (about US $25) in some places.
“The geography of crime in the country is marking life in at least two-thirds of the national territory. The symptoms are noted in the southeast, in places like Oaxaca, Michoacán, Guerrero, … in Mexico City in boroughs like Cuauhtémoc and Miguel Hidalgo [and] in Coahuila, Nuevo León, Zacatecas,” Rivera said.
“… These groups focus on stable businesses like taco restaurants, [small inexpensive eateries called] fondas [and] shops. That’s where they start, and people don’t report them because in a lot of areas, the line between police and criminals isn’t clear. The crime economy is very active,” he said.
“There is evidence that these gangs are, little by little, taking control of … the distribution and commercialization of products. This is [a] very delicate [situation],” Rivera said before adding that decisive action could stop the problem from getting worse.
Another place where criminal activity has affected the availability of chicken is Ciudad Hidalgo, Michoacán, located about 100 kilometers east of the state capital of Morelia. Residents were left without chicken and red meat earlier this year due to a dispute between the Los Correa Cartel and a cell of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel called Grupo X, Milenio reported.
“We closed due to insecurity,” said Óscar Mañón, a chicken vendor in the Emiliano Zapata market. “… They’re letting us work now, but I don’t know whether [the same thing] could happen again.”
According to Ciudad Hidalgo Mayor José Luis Téllez, butcher shops and chicken shops closed after receiving threats from both crime groups involved in the dispute. Prior to the monthlong meat dearth, which began in late January, a group of armed men attacked the municipal slaughterhouse and killed five workers.
In Oaxaca, extortion complaints have increased in the coastal municipalities of Santiago Pinotepa Nacional and Santiago Jamiltepec over the past three months, according to local authorities. Business owners say they have received phone calls and messages from criminals demanding payments and threatening consequences if they don’t comply. The extortionists have acted on those threats in Pinotepa Nacional, where a butcher and two other people were recently killed.
In Baja California, fishermen are regularly extorted by organized crime who demand a percentage of sales and control prices, Tijuana newspaper Seminario Zeta reported in February.
Extortion is also a problem thousands of kilometers to the north in Tijuana, Baja California, especially in Sánchez Taboada, which has been described as the most dangerous neighborhood in the country’s most dangerous city. According to Baja California Attorney General Ricardo Iván Carpio, criminals collect extortion payments from a range of businesses in the area, including auto repair shops and butchers.
However, authorities are making progress in their fight against the crime, Carpio said, noting that 50 priority targets, including extortionists, have been arrested in the past 13 days.
Though daylight savings time was established by presidential decree, López Obrador said it would be better if it was ended by the legislature.
President López Obrador announced Wednesday that he will send a bill to Congress to eliminate daylight saving time.
The bill will go to either the Chamber of Deputies or the Senate next week, he told reporters at his regular news conference.
“I’m going to send it because I have the studies and I have a survey,” López Obrador said, explaining that the government asked people whether they want daylight saving time or not.
The president said earlier this month that government studies showed that the savings generated by daylight saving time are “minimal and the harm to health is considerable.”
López Obrador said Wednesday that the Interior Ministry conducted a telephone survey last week and found 71% support for elimination. He didn’t reveal how many people were polled but pledged to present the survey results next week.
AMLO indicated that he was unconcerned by the possibility that opposition lawmakers will stop his bill from becoming law, asserting that he was doing his bit by getting the initiative to Congress. Asked whether he would eliminate summer time by decree if lawmakers don’t approve his bill, he responded:
“It’s better that it’s done in Congress. … It’s better off being a reform to some of the secondary laws than a constitutional reform.”
Former president Ernesto Zedillo established the nationwide observance of daylight saving time by decree in early 1996.
AMLO said June 1 that there was a good chance that the practice of changing clocks twice a year at the start and end of daylight saving time would be terminated this year. On Monday he responded to concerns that the elimination of summer time would have an adverse effect on the economy, rejecting claims that the stock market will fall and there will be higher inflation.
“No, no, nothing will happen. … It’s very probable that there won’t be summer time [in the future] because people don’t want the time change,” López Obrador said.
