24 Hours Later, Agribusiness Owners Disown Agreement with Baja Farmworkers Olga Aragon - La Jornada
go to original May 16, 2015

Bernardo Velasco Vasquez, 47, is among an estimated 50,000 farmworkers on strike. (Don Bartletti/TNS)

The owners of farmland in the valley of San Quintín disown the substantial agreement that Francisco Vega de Lamadrid [Governor of Baja California] made with the farmworkers mobilizing in demand of a minimum daily wage of 200 pesos [US $13.33].

Twenty-four hours after the President and federal authorities celebrated what looked like the end of a conflict that has partially paralyzed the southern region of Baja California, they reiterated that they will only give the 15 percent wage increase that they had offered since the strike began. The owners also explained that they did not participate in the negotiating session where the 13 agreements were signed that seemed to satisfy the parties [farmworkers, state and federal officials].

Thus, the owners - several of whom are current and former officials of the PAN [National Action Party] state administrations - deceived the Governor of Baja California, who had pledged to ensure that the proposal (wage increase by the employers) would result in an increase as close as possible to the Alliance's [Alliance of Organizations for Social Justice] demand (200 pesos) and that it might be retroactive to May 24. All this occurred in a context where the federal government offered to form a trust to make up the difference between the farmworkers' demand and what the agribusiness owners might be willing to pay.

At a press conference during which the large agribusiness owners spoke for the first time on their own behalf - they always used the state government to take their proposals to the negotiating session - Marco Estudillo Bernal, spokesman for Agricultural Council of Baja California, repeated that the farmers will not pay more than the 15 percent wage increase that they granted last March 27. The spokesman also reported that Alberto Muñoz, their organization's legal representative at the 14-hour negotiating session - chaired by David Garay Maldonado, head of the Government Unit at the Secretariat of Government Relations [SEGOB] - attended only [as an observer] in order to know what was discussed, but without authority to agree or negotiate.

Read the rest at Mexico Voices

Mexico Voices is a blogging endeavor aimed at raising the awareness of U.S. citizens regarding the destructive impact of the U.S. economic policy and the War on Drugs on Mexico — on its people, their economic and physical security and their human rights, on the nation’s dysfunctional justice system, and on the rule of law and Mexico’s fragile democracy. Visit the website at MexicoVoices.blogspot.mx

We invite you to add your charity or supporting organizations' news stories and coming events to PVAngels so we can share them with the world. Do it now!