Subject: Re: It's not just 2 pesos; It's the country Mexico City's
#PosMeSalto Movement Protests Rising Transit Costs
This is absolutely obscene.
Two thoughts occur to me.
1. The Ruling Class, regardless of the name of the country, continues to
use the same tactics which have kept them in power. What they fail to
understand is that the masses are growing in number and in poverty. Once
they have nothing left to give up, the Masses will give up their lives, in
an all out crush of the Ruling Class.
2. Combine the need for money with the fear of abject poverty and the
Ruling Class has an unlimited pool of workers willing to take jobs as police
officers. This has also worked from the Dawn of Property Rights. But
again, times they are a changing.
Growing Masses around the world will rise up when it becomes their only
option for survival. The bought and paid for police officers will begin to
see that they are on the losing side, and as quickly as they licked the
Master's boots for his money, they will turn on him and steal not only the
Master's boots, but everything he possesses.
The day will come because the Ruling Classes cannot conceive that it will
ever happen. They are the last to know in every revolution or uprising in
history.
Carl Jarvis
----- Original Message -----
From: "S. Kashdan" <skashdan@scn.org>
To: "Blind Democracy List" <blind-democracy@octothorp.org>
Sent: Sunday, January 19, 2014 10:38 PM
Subject: It's not just 2 pesos; It's the country Mexico City's #PosMeSalto
Movement Protests Rising Transit Costs
It's not just 2 pesos; It's the country Mexico City's #PosMeSalto Movement
Protests Rising Transit Costs
by Andalusia Knoll
Friday, January 10, 2014 1528
http://www.upsidedownworld.org/main/mexico-archives-79/4635-qits-not-just-2-pesos-its-the-countryq-mexico-citys-posmesalto-movement-protests-rising-transit-costs?tmpl=component&print=1&page=
Mexico City's extensive subway system, constantly packed with its 5 million
daily users, has just become one of the most expensive public transit
systems in the world. On December 13th, 2013 the subway fare was raised from
three pesos (roughly 25 cents ) to five pesos (roughly 40 cents.) Basic
mathematics informs you that this is a whopping 66.66% increase, placing
Mexico City transit costs at the top of the list among the top 30 countries
within the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). To
understand how a 50 cent fare is considered one of the most expensive in the
world, you have to take into account Mexico City's minimum wage which has
stagnated around 64 pesos, just shy of five dollars for a day's work.
Therefore, a basic daily commute can account for a minimum of one sixth of
one's daily salary and sometimes up to one half if the commuter has to pay
extra for buses or minivans to travel from their house or job to the subway
stop.
Confronted by this daunting reality of prohibitively expensive public
transit, hundreds of students and young people, largely coordinated via
social networks, organized #PosMeSalto on the first day of the fare
increase. #PosMeSalto loosely translates into, "guess, i'll just jump," a
city wide transportation protest which took place in the majority of major
train stations on the first day of the fare hike. In the stations,
participants assisted thousands of commuters in jumping over the turnstiles,
ducking under them or sliding through sideways. Even subway police officers
declines to intervene, and some even assisted passengers to duck below,
begging them not to vault over the turnstile.
One of the popular chants during the #PosMeSalto actions was "they didn't
survey me, I'm just gonna duck below." Chanters were referencing a Mitofsky
survey that was conducted over two days with only 2400 participants, or a
mere .05% of the commuter population of the city. The questions were front
loaded, asking commuters if they would be in favor of a two peso increase if
the government promised to improve service, increase ventilation and up
security in the wagons. The population of the metropolitan area of Mexico
City is currently estimated at 21 million people and has far outgrown the
current system. Often commuters have to wait for three trains to pass by
before they can even board a wagon in which people are literally packed in
like sardines. With these kind of frustrations and questions worded with a
focus on the improvements, 52% of the 2400 people surveyed said they would
be in support of a fare hike. This government later plastered the statistic
all over the subway system in slick advertising promoting the fare hike. In
the months before the fare hike, many commuters, including the author of
this article, noted a worsening of the subway service, and some suspected
that the transit authorities slowed service to convince people of the
necessity of a fare hike.
One student spoke anonymously in a video published by Subversiones AAC about
what he viewed as the metro's false promises. "We didn't see any
improvements when they raised the fare before, it continued to be the same,
so it's ridiculous for them to raise it," commented the young man. Like him,
many commuters were outraged by the Mitofsky survey and pointed out the
small percentage of people who were surveyed, affirming their opposition to
the fare hike.
In contrast, an independent group of multidisciplinary researchers from the
Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) conducted an online study in which
over 34,000 people participated, of which close to 30,000 entries were
considered valid. Of these 30,000, who hailed from neighborhoods all across
the city and metropolitan region, 93% said they were against the fare hike.
A popular sign among protesters read "It's not just two pesos, it's the
country." The fare hike was implemented the same week in December as the
passage of an energy reform bill which facilitates the privatization of
Mexico's nationalized oil company Pemex. Also, a new Mexico City protest law
which restricts freedom of expression, was fast tracked through city
government a few days before the hike. The protest law will confine protests
to certain streets, impose a limited schedule, require government sanction
and prohibit any activities that counter "good customs" however they may be
defined. However, this law did not seem to prevent any subway stop actions.
Johann Rodriguez, an organizer with #PosMeSalto says direct actions like the
turnstile takeovers are "the only way we can be heard, any other way the
government wouldn't pay attention to us." [1]
In addition to the subway stops, participants of #PosMeSalto have also taken
to the streets. There they have been met with repeated police repression.
During two successive large protests, hundreds of protesters were surrounded
by police and not allowed to march from their starting point of the Angel of
Independence on Reforma, one of the city's major avenues. Eventually, after
a few hours delay, the marchers were allowed to proceed. However, the police
encapsulation was a clear sign of the restrictions sanctioned by the new
protests law. Even before the law was passed, Mexico City experienced an
increase in repression of social movements under the leadership of newly
elected mayor Miguel Mancera. During protests taking place over the past
year, hundreds of people have been arbitrarily detained or beaten including
bystanders and street vendors who were not even participating. A few
thousand people participated in these #PosMeSalto mobilizations but,
considering the general outrage to the fare increase, it seems likely that
many did not take to the streets, fearing probable police repression.
Diana Cortaza participated in the actions in the subway with her daughter
and says that she already couldn't afford the subway and that the fare hike
just makes her life more difficult. A few years back, she dropped out of the
free public university because she couldn't afford her commute. The
government of Mexico City has said that they will issue close to 30,000
tickets for discount fares. However, statistics indicate that there are over
2 million people living below the poverty rate, and these discount fares won't
even make a dent. It is also important to note that there are no discount
weekly or monthly passes or cards that allow free transfers to buses.
This fare hike coincided with the announcement of a 2.50 peso increase in
minimum wage, an amount that is not even enough to cover the hike for a
round trip ticket. These 2.50 pesos represent a 3 percent increase, roughly
in line with inflation, thus hardly an increase at all. Meanwhile the cost
of essential goods continues to rise, especially the price of food including
the corn tortilla, which is a staple of the Mexican diet.
Cortaza says residents are going to keep protesting and she is convinced
that they can revoke the fare hike. "The government has passed their reforms
because we haven't protested, subjecting us to more misery," commented
Cortaza, urging more people to participate in the actions. Some members of
the Passe Libre movement from Brazil participated in the protests and shared
strategies from the successful mobilizations that revoked Brazil's transit
hike in 2013. Their movement brought together students and workers to
protest the hike, declaring that accessible or free transit is a basic
social right.
While it's unclear whether or not the #PosMeSalto movement will gather more
force and continue to brake the train fare hike, it is clear that Mexicans
will continue to suffer economically in a neoliberalized economy. In the
first few weeks of the fare hike, the subway service has not improved at all
and the government has not complied with their promise to make the subway
more "secure" by evicting the thousands of vendors who sell goods in the
wagons. They have merely put up offensive signs stating "If you don't buy
from them, they will disappear." How thoroughly the government intends for
the evicted and already vulnerable ambulatory vendors to "disappear" is
unclear. In an interview with Desinformemonos, Homero Aguilar, a leader of
an organization of workers in the informal economy commented "Creating a
source of employment is not a crime. Annihilating alternatives for survival
for poor people is essentially annihilating them." [2]
The people of Mexico City, however, are resisting this annihilation in
ubiquitous as well as organized ways. These days it is hard to enter the
subway without seeing a defiant young person, awaiting the aversion of a
police officer's glance to slide under the turnstile.
Andalusia Knoll is a multimedia journalist based in Mexico City. She is a
frequent contributor to Free Speech Radio News,Truthout and The Real News
Network and collaborates with various independent media collectives
throughout Mexico includingSubversiones. You can follow her on Twitter at
@andalalucha and view more or her work on her blog.
[1] Ramos, Dulce, " Los puntos que debes conocer de Ley de Manifestaciones."
Animal Politico (December 11, 2013).
[2] Barro, Tonelada, "Los vagoneros del metro, los otros damnificados de
Mancera." Desinformemonos (December 15, 2013).
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